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THE 



ANTI-CRITIC 



FOR 



AUGUST 1821, AND MARCH, 1822. 



CONTAINING 



LITERARY, NOT POLITICAL, CRITICISMS, 
AND OPINIONS. 



BY 



Sir EGERTON BRYDGES , Bar.'^ 





GENEVA, 

PRINTED BY W. FICK. 

MDCCCXXII. 



r 75 Copies. ) 



^^^;-^ 



\ 



*% 



P R E F A C E. 



J- HE Reader has here a Melange of Counter- 
Criticisms ; and other Fragments ; — of what 
value , he will decide according to his taste. 

The range of Literature is now become so 
extensive , that new combinations present them- 
selves in every form. If the memory be hea* 
vily taxed by this abundance, the judgement also 
is still more in demand. Without the guide of 
some simple principle, it is impossible to have 
even a confused recollection of the conflicting 
hterary opinions , which meet us every suc- 
cessive month. 

As i^ Libertas sine scientia licentia esfy) so it 
is with Criticism. It is a dangerous weapon 
in the hands of the half-learned ; or of those, 
who want, sincerity and integrity. It is so easy to 
give a pausibte appearance to either censure 
or praise , that much , after all , must depend 
upon authority ! The dictum of a well-read 
scholar who speaks conscientiously , is better 
than the most ingenious and powerful argument 
of one not known to be sincere ! 



But as this Volume is not confined to Cri- 
ticism , something may be required to be said 
of the Fragments and Miscellanies , which are 
intermixed; or rather appended. All the apo- 
logy that can be made is , that this Book was 
found a convenient repository for preserving 
them. As the work is principally intended 
for gratuitous distribution among the Author's 
friends, he conceives that he is fully justified 
in having taken this liberty. They who care 
nothing about Fainilj History , may easily pass 
over the pages of Epitaphs and Inscriptions, 

A great deal is said about the evil of mul- 
tiplying Books. This may be an evil to the 
few , who think themselves obliged to read ; 
yet do not like reading. It can scarcely be an 
evil to any one else : and these are people , 
who surely deserve little consideration. All 
others may, if they will , decline, not only to 
read , but to buy. The ill consequences there- 
fore of a work not in demand , or not useful, 
whether from want of merit , or want of fitness 
to the prevailing taste, all rest with the author, 
or his publisher , subject to the above excep- 
tion. 

But though unquestionably the number of 
superfluous publications is very great, nothing 
can be so untrue as that Ave have already 
books enough. The major part of Books are 



PREFACE. V 

compiled by those , who have no powers of 
thinking. Yet of these a large part may be 
useful , and even necessary ; because the same 
materials may require to be revived, differently 
placed , or newly combined. But of those who 
can think for themselves , and think vigorously, 
or even ingeniously , the labours can never 
be unprofitable. Innumerable sentiments, and 
innumerable nice distinctions in morals , poli- 
tics, etc., yet remain undeveloped; and they, 
who unite to the rare capacity for such tasks 
the still rarer combination , with it , of exer- 
cise, culture , and practised facility of perfor- 
mance, neglect their talents and their duties , 
if they pass their lives in the languor and 
inaction of silence. It is seldom , till after middle 
life, spent in writing as well as in reflection, 
that, in prose at least, an author obtains that 
frankness and mellowness of style, which enables 
him to convey original thoughts in a clear and 
interesting manner. Few can go alone ; few exer- 
cise any other faculty than memory; and of the 
few who do, the proportion is very small, of 
those who can find language for their ovs^n 
thoughts. 

If it be objected, that no thoughts, however 
original , and however well expressed , will 
justify publication , in a detached and fragmental 
form, it may perhaps be answered, that, though 



VI FREFACE. 

method and system may, and ought to be, the 
final result, yet, for the ehicidation of truth, 
the materials are best collected separately, as 
they occur: for nothing produces more narrow 
and erroneous views , than to set out with 
systems ; though a certain class of Uterati , cal- 
hng themselves philosophic , pride themselves 
so much upon this mode of disciplining their 
minds ! 

Thoughts, that must wait their turn, till their 
place in the system calls them forth , lose all 
their freshness ; and appear at last pressed 
into the form , which suits the system-monger's 
purpose. He who speaks from the fulness of 
his conviction or his heart , at the moment 
when the conviction or the sentiment has been 
impressed upon him , has a force and frank- 
ness in the communication , which bears with 
it its own evidence. The ceremonial language 
of an author , writing by rule , and composing 
solely with a view to public passport, is, (like 
the conversation of a Courtier , who spends 
all his life in societies in which he is upon his 
good behaviour) empty; and unmeaning; — vox, 
et prceterea nihil ! — For this reason, we look 
into the private letters of eminent men with 
so much curiosity , anxiety , and interest. The 
language of the heart is always the same : it is 
the artificial language of technical literature , 



which changes ! Not all the genius of Dante 
himself would have made him blaze , as he 
does , to all posterity , but for this ! It was 
this, that threw off the rust of antiquity! it was 
this that anticipated the language of centuries ! 
And now that , with a mind never at rest , 
reaching at a thousand unattainable objects , 
waisting his strength in pursuit of a diversity of 
knowlege , when a single branch may be too 
much for his powers ; — with a decaying cons- 
titution , and a desponding heart ; verging 
towards the completion of his sixtieth year ; — 
the Author presents this volume among the 
numerous crude fruits of his daily occupation, 
the few readers , into whose hands it may fall, 
must take it as they will , without farther depre- 
cation of their censure! The Author has lived 
too long to expect praise ; or even the avoid- 
ance of disapprobation. Who is bold enough 
to judge for himself ? All the world who con- 
cern themselves with books , literary and un- 
literary, swear by some leader ! If the spirit of 
political hibeTty has spread in these days, even 
the cvisk for literary liberty has ceased in the 
world : and there is a tame and entire sub- 
mission to literary servitude , which does not 
even excite a murmur 1 but what is most curious 
is , that this dominion is usurped , not by lite- 
rary , but by political despots ! 



VIII PREFACE. 

That we are « fallen on evil days , » that 
erudition and sound sense have ceased ; that 
if a few instances of extraordinary genius occilr, 
they have become dangerous by their eccen- 
tricities ; that in some of the main departments 
of literature there is not even an attempt to 
produce any fruit ; that Criticism above all has 
become frightfully mischievous and wicked, by 
audacious intrigue , audacious disregard of inte- 
grity , and audacious charlatanism ; that the 
public mind is corrupt, frivolous, and servile, 
to • an unexampled degree — are truths so in- 
contestable, as not to be disguised by applying 
to them the unjust appellation of morbid que- 
rulousness ! 

The materials , which offer themselves to be 
worked upon by the human mind , are neces- 
sarily multiplied in an infinite degree beyond 
those of former times. Five hundred authors 
could scarcely, by a dedication of their whole 
lives, master literary history alone. Yet pert 
witlings of yesterday , who scarcely know the 
title of a work beyond their own nation and 
their own time, affect to pronounce critical judge- 
ments on subjects , which require the most 
profound knowlege and profound taste , such as 
can only be attained by the most extended 
inquiry , and the most extended comparison ! 
All the wisdom of ages is to them dead lumber; 



PREFACE. IX 

and the groaning shelves of mighty Libraries, 
had better, in their opinions, be 

« Purged hy the sword , and purified by fire ! » 

Frightful and overwhelming masses , which re- 
proach their ignorance , and destroy their viva- 
city ! How happy for the world to be rid of 
them; and be suffered to think for itself; — 
without prejudice ; - — unshackled and unbur- 
dened ; — as light ; — but , alas , a little more 
empty ! — 



Ye mighty Dead , whose souls in magic spell 
luscribed upon the dingy pages dwell , 
And ranged on groaning shelves in close-piled rows , 
In sad sepulchral dust and damp repose , 
How dread the silence , that , with brooding wi?igs , 
O'er you a deathlike melancholy flings ! 
Pent in the closed leaves the smother'd fire , 
Spite of its struggles , ceases to respire ! 
Your oracles are dumb ; your gifted lore 
Teaches a dull, benighted A\orld no more! 
To other sounds their ears attuned ; their eyes 
Far other marks of mental vision prize ! 



From your past notes some vigour to derive , 
Neglected e'en in life ; condemn'd in vain , 
Amid unhearing crowds , to raise the strain ; 
In death companion of your mournful doom , 
Shall soothe his spirit by congenial gloom, 



X PREFACE. 

Placed mid your rants , his hovering ghost shall try 
To turn to triumph chill Oblivion's sigh ; 
And back upon the scorner throw the scorn, 
That long ^vilh such indignant pride was borne ! 



To form a due taste , and proper judgement 
of excellence, in the art of painting, a familiar 
acquaintance with the works of the old Masters 
is universally acknowleged to be necessary. 
Why should it not be so in literary composi- 
tion ? The old Masters in Painting were not 
more superior to the present , than the authors 
of former Centuries to those now flourishing ! 
Scholarship , labour , novelty , energy , warm 
hope , freedom from the poisonous blights of 
malignant technical Criticism , all contributed 
to furnish the means of a great preeminence. 
Few but charlatans now meet with encourage- 
ment. Charlatanism is become almost necessary 
to engage the vitiated taste of the Public. 

But the charlatanism of literary Journals far 
exceeds that of all other publications. At the 
same time it cannot be denied , that one or 
two of them occasionally put forth most elo- 
cpient and most profound emanations of critical 
discussion — no doubt , a little exaggerated 
and overwrought ; — for their praise , like 
their censure, pays little regard to limits; and 
they cannot be said to be economisers of either 



PREFACE. XI 

the one , or the other ! Sometimes an author 
is hfted up, that they may shew with what an 
abundant richness of ingenuity they can say 
fine things : but more often he is cried down, 
that they may enjoy the vent of a bitter jest ; 
or of more bitter raillery ! — 

MuRETUS has the following passage , which 
shews how like one age is to another. 

« JEtas nostra mirijicam quandam extulit vim 
hominuin improbo,rujn , qui magnam laudem in 
obttectatione positam putant , neque quicquam 
cupidius faciunt y quam ut quicquid possunt y 
quacunque ratione possunt^ ex aliena gloria de- 
terant , creduntque ita se demum emersuros , si 
eos qui extant^ depresserint Quam rationem 
grassandi ad Jamam nemo umquam sapiens 
approbavit, » 

M. Anton. Muretus. Fariar, Lection, Lib. i. 
cap. VI. 



Geneva , !i5 April 18^2. 



KII PREFACE. 



« Vos tandem , haud vacui mei labores , 

Quicquid hoc sterile fudit ingenium , 

Jam sero placidam sperare jubeo 

Perfunctam invidia requiem , sedesque beatas , 

Quas bonus Hermes , 

Et tutela dabit solers Roiisi ; 

Quo neque lingua procax vulgi penetrabit, atque longe 

Turba legentum prava facesset : 

At ultimi nepotes, 

Et cordatior oetas , 

Judicia rebus sequiora forsitan 

Adhibebit , integro sinu. 

Tum, livore sepulto , 

Si quid meremur sana posteritas sciet , 

Roiisio favente. » 

Joannes Miltonus ad Joannem Rousium , Oxonienns Aca- 
demics Bibliothecarium, 1646. f Inter Poemata Latina. J 



/THE ANTI-CRITIC. 

/ AUGUST 1821. 

/ . ■ I- 

INTRODUCTORY. CHARACTER OF MODERN 
/ CRITICISM. 



XiiXAGGERATiON , Studied piquancy, partiality, envy, 
ignorance , affectation , bad taste , political , national , sec- 
tarian , and personal interests , with private intrigue , all 
pervade and debase even the best periodical Criticisms of 
the present day. 

These works are now become mere manufactures of 
trade ; and are addressed rather to the passions , capaci- 
ties, and acquirements of the multitude, than of the learned 
world. 

Instead of intermingling ^\he notice of Publications of a 
temporary nature , these Journals admit scarcely any thing 
else ; and the writers live so much within the atmosphere 
of factitious interests , that they can judge of nothing with 
the calmness calculated to establish permanent opinions. 

Voyages , Travels , Pamphlets on the transient politics 
of the day , dull discussions of professional science in 
which men are endeavouring to force themselves into dis- 
tinction for the purpose of aiding their professional advan- 
cement , engross the place of elegant Hterature ; of what 
increases our moral knowlege ; ameliorates the heart j and 
exalts the fancy. 

I 



2 THE ANTl- CRITIC 

Nothing is more certain , than that otir literature is at pre-* 
sent highly corrupt. It is an incident to the stage of society, 
at which we have arrived ; and whoever doubts it , has 
so far vitiated his taste, as to be insensible to the beauty 
of simplicity and chaste colouring. Every thing is now got 
up ( to use a vulgar and technical phrase ) , for effect ! 
All is bought ; and the publisher pays in proportion as 
the article is striking , and full of glare ! It is boasted , 
that these Critics lead the public taste : — they are its slaves : 
they follow it ; — often in chains ; — and lick the dust 
of its heels ! They delight to foment its prejudices ; and 
pander to its degrading appetites. 

I know riot that Criticism has taken so caustic and so- 
phisticated a character in any other part of Europe , as in 
England. But the popular literature in all tends to the same 
extravagance and hyperbole. This is exemplified in Mad. 
de Stael, who was gifted with a very extraordinary force 
of mind , but whose style and thoughts surely much 
abound in factitious vehemence and laboured grandeur ; 
and whose invention does not appear to me to have been 
her primary quality. 

What is wise and true, leaves us in a state of calm 
pleasure , and gentle reflection : it neither exhausts , nor 
satiates. Oratory ought to chastise itself by the models of 
the more sedate operations of the closet : but the closet 
now borrows the heat and intemperance of the senate and 
the forum. Criticism is in the hands of the turbulent agi- 
tators of faction , and practical society. 

Of any age , the number of Literati whose memories 
survive them , is small. Many of their names may be ins- 
cribed in the voluminous Biographies , which are loaded 
with the registry of obscure men ; but there they lie 
buried and unnoticed. 



MODERN CRITICISM. 3 

All tliose secondary talents, wliicli borrowing the ideas 
of others , adapt them to the subject that occupies the 
attention of the hour , and thus obtain a false interest to 
efforts which possess no original and enduring merit , 
soon fade from the public observation ; and if , when the 
occasion is past , we recur to these performances , we are 
astonish^ that they could ever have excited even a tem- 
porary notice. 

So long as Literature is open to all these adscititious 
avenues to Fame , the temple will be filled with false as- 
pirants, who will occupy the places, that ought to be held 
by Genius and unaffected Learning. 

Among the rarest merits of writing is simplicity. It re- 
quires a native abundance , or an unfailing native strength, 
which few have ever possessed. Artifice is used, when the 
funds of Nature are deficient. As long as the thought pre- 
vails over the mind , the dress of language is little consi- 
dered : it is the form in its own naked force , that occu- 
pies the mental eye. But penury of conception or senti- 
ment often resorts to the trick of verbiage. I could mention 
authors , some of whose popular poems are nothing but a 
pretty dance of words. They convey neither sentiments, 
nor ideas. But never yet was there intrinsic merit in a 
passage , where an author was not sincere in the senti- 
ments which he expressed. 

Though the operations of Genius and of Memory are 
often confounded , no two powers can be more unlike 
in their natures and effects. One is cold as the borrowed 
light of the Moon : the other has all the genial and crea- 
tive warmth of the Sun. One relates an impression from 
the recollection of its signs : the other from its visionary 
presence. 

IJseful as the Memory is in bringing forward and arran- 



4 THE Al^fTI- CRITIC 

ging what exists , it can add notliing to the existing stores. 
It is by the lamp of Fancy that we penetrate to the altar 
of the heart ; and behold its rites and its movements irra- 
diated before ns. It is thus that we illustrate the science of 
morals ; and advance the noblest of all philosophy. 



II. 



ON THE PREVAILING ENGLISH OPINIONS 
ON POETRY. 



It may perhaps be asserted , that there has been little 
pure , simple , and consistent Cf ilicism on Poetry in England 
since the death of Addison , more than a century ago. 
Almost all periodical Criticism , being conducted by those 
who have worked on it as a task , has been principally 
under the direction of artificial systems , of one kind or 
another. It requires so much less native taste, and native 
acuteness , to discover this technical merit , that this pre- 
ference is the inevitable result in those who are drawn 
to the subject by constraint rather than by inclination. 

The question regarding the comparative genius of Pope, 
which Joseph Warton brought before the Public nearly 
seventy years past , has been again revived : and with 
some advantage in carrying back the inquiry into the first 
principles of this Art. Pope is altogethei an Author , through 
whom the question may be fairly discussed. 

I shall not begin with a definition of Poetry, because. 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 5 

as Johnson says , definitions are dangerous ; and as it would 
commence with a formality, which on the present occasion 
I am desirous to avoid. 

It is the idea of mystery ; the supposition that it involves 
something distinct in its nature from the truths which 
are proper for prose , that leads to all the erroneous opi- 
nions, and all the corrupt taste on this subject. No rational 
man can doubt that Pope was a great poet : the only 
question is , whether all his poetry was of an high class ; 
and whether the multitude do not estimate him by his 
worst rather than his best productions! 

Narrowness is the sin of the English taste in Poetry : — 
but not the only one ! It loves extravagance , and false 
glitter ; and mistakes distortion for genius ! So that it not 
only excludes a great deal of the best from the character 
of true poetry; but what it admits is mostly false ! — 

It may not be difficult to account for this , if we look 
to the manner , in which the public mind is led : — but 
it would perhaps be invidious. — 

That , which surprises me is , that a single age can 
consider itself to have the fate of the fortunate Beings , 
who for the first time have come to the true light ! If it 
is correct , almost all that has been deemed genius and 
poetry from the time of the Greeks and Romans , through 
all the scholars of Itaiy and the rest of Europe at the 
Revival of Learning , down almost to the close of the 
last Century, must be proscribed! We must take the 
Universal Biography , and erase the names of more than 
nine tenths, of those who stand recorded there as Poets ! 
A mind , not of overweening conceit , would hesitate at 
this ! It would pause to enquire , if our predecessors are 
not as likely to have been right as ourselves ; it would doubt, 
if the principle could be accurate , which should exclude 
so much pleasure, and so much instruction : it would 



, THE AT^TI-CRITIC 

seek for some broader limits , and some essences of a 
more enlarged nature ! 

A small degree of ingenuity would suffice to discover 
them. Poetry is nothing more confined , than a forcible 
and harmonious representation of the lively movements of a 
powerful mind I It is a picture : — yet a picture, not of 
matter; but of the mental impression, whether of matter, 
or idea , or sensation ; or all united ! 

Mere versification does not constitute poetry , because 
the thought may be trite , or false ; and cold and lifeless. 
But a moral axiom , when conceived with energy , and 
expressed with force, is poetry, if conveyed in rhythmical 
language ! Some of Shakespeare's finest passage are of this 
kind : and this may be observed also of Spenser , Milton » 
Cowley, and Dryden ! In truth, in the walks of Poetry, 
no one ever continued the favourite of ages , whose pro- 
ductions did not comprehend the merits of a moral poet ! 

Invention is said to be the first quality of Poetry ; But 
not the invention, which 

Humano capiti cervicem jungit equinam , 
Undique collaiis membris. 

On what is the species of Invention , which entitles the 
possessor to a place in the first class of Genius ; to what 
extent it is necessary ; from what causes it arises ; and 
wherein it may be dispensed with ; the progress of this 
Paper will develop my opinions. 

The radical mistake in the fashionable mode of thinking 
upon this subject , is the assumption that that part of the 
Intellect, distinguished as Understanding, or Reason, is no 
active or necessary quality in the production of good 
poetry. The Understanding , without fancy or sensibility , is 
not sufficient : but still it is an indispensible ingredient. 
Truth is as much the foundation of poetry , as of Philoso- 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 7 

phy ; though the former may take different modes of re- 
presenting it from the latter. 

It would open too wide a field to enter here into abs- 
truse psychological discussions : — What is fancy ; whence 
it is supplied ; or how far it represents , or is intended 
to represent , with exactness , mateiial objects , are even 
yet in some degree questions of doubt and darkness (i). 
A conclusion of the Understanding, drawn from memory ; 
and separated from the mental presence of the image , or 
the sentiment , that gave birth to it , is not poetry. 

But if poetry be the result of the highest riches of the 
mind, composed from internal, as well as external sources, 
iaugmented by its own labour and activity , how could any 
Critic even dream that an image drawn from the combined 
effects of natural materials and human genius , is in every 
case inferior to a simple image of external nature ? Lord 
Byron has asked with as much truth as wit , « is not the 
image of a large ship under sail more poetical than an hog 
sailing in an high wind? » If the latter were deemed supe- 
rior , it might as well be said , that the image of a man 
in a barbarous state is more poetical _, than of a man 
cultivated by education ; and refined by politeness. Provi- 
dence has left to human Beings to do much for themselves; 
and by their own exertions to train and expand into excellence 
the powers bestowed on them ! 

To contend that poetry is excellent in proportion as it 
IS an exact representation of an external image , even 
though it should be added that this image must be magni- 
ficent or beautiful , is to lower poetry far below Painting; 
and absolutely to lay aside its primary quality , its intel- 

(i) See Bonstetten's Recherches sur la nature et les lots de Vlma^ 
gination : and his latest publication, Etudes de Vhomme^ ou Recher- 
ches sur les JucuUes de sentir et de penser. Geueye 1821; 2 vol, 8." 



8 THE ANTIrCRITIC 

lectuality I — How often do we hear it said of a specimen 
of a modern poem : « How exquisite I — It is quite a 
picture I •» Again of some of the noblest passages of our 
elder poets. — « O these are no poetry ! They want 
imagery, and description I « Take a passage , at hazard, 
from the xi*^ Book of Paradise Lost -— one of Adam's 
answers to the Angel Michael repealing the future to him : 

« O visions ill foreseen! Better had I 

Lived ignorant of future! So had borne 

My part of evil only , each day's lot 

Enough to bear ; those now, that were dispensed 

The burden ef many ages , on me light 

At once, by my foreknowlege gaining birth 

Abortive , to torment me ere their being , 

With thought that they must be. Let no man seek 

Henceforth to be foretold , what shall befall 

Him , or his children ; evil he may be sure , 

Which neither his foreknowing can prevent ; 

And he the future evil shall no less 

In apprehension than in substance feel , 

Grievous to bear; but that care now is past; 

Man is not whom to warn : those few escaped , 

Famine and anguish will at last consume , 

Wandering that watery desert ; I had hope 

When violence was ceased ; and war on earth , 

All would have then gone well; peace would have crown'd 

With length of happy days the race of man ; 

But I was far deceived; for now I see 

Peace to corrupt no less than war to waste. 

How comes it thus ? Unfold , celestial guide , 

And whether here the race of man will end. » 

It is , no doubt , the business of poetry to carry us into 
the fields of Imagination : but not into the fields of childish , 



MODERN TA.STE IN POETRY. Q 

tawdry , and factitious Imagination ! It is our business to 
imagine Beings consistent with the probability of their sup- 
posed natures : we are however to imagine , or invent , not 
only their material forms ; but also their intellectual struc- 
ture ; their thoughts , and feelings ! 

We are taught to survey this beautiful globe of inani- 
mate objects with a Poet's eyes , when he enables us to 
associate with it those sentiments and those visions , which 
his tremulous heart and plastic fancy furnish. In the tem- 
ple of his mind is built up a spiritual world , which if it 
draws something from external matter , draws more from 
its own inward fountains. It delights to give vent to the 
fullness of this splendor by communicating to others por- 
tions of this magic imminglement ! But these associations 
must always be in sympathy with the feelings and percep 
tions of our general nature^ If they arise from peculiar 
habits ; or from extravagant Or forced trains of thought , 
they will find no echo but in the few and sophisticated 
bosoms , which seek after novelty at the expence of truth. 

It ought to excite no wonder, that a true Poet is a 
very rare Being , when we reflect on all the various and 
high qualities of nature , and also the cultivation , toil , 
and opportunity, which it requires, to make one! Of those 
in whom all these singular gifts and circumstances unite , 
probably at least two thirds are silenced by cold and 
cruel discouragement. The calamities of Life , to which 
this class are from their temperaments and habits extraor- 
dinarily exposed , extinguish the fire and debilitate the 
genius of others ! 

But another cause has been in operation for a frightful 
length of time , which perhaps has not been less destruc- 
tive to the fruits of the real poet than these ! It is false 
criticism ; and a vicious taste in the public , which deems 
absurdity a proof of genius; and what is orig^inal because 

a 



10 THE ANTI- CRITIC 

it is monstrous , excellent because it is new ! The sensitive 
disposition of him , whose endowments fit him for a Poet , 
often makes him in youth timid and self - diffident. He is 
turned from his natural ambitions ; and attempts to enter 
a path , where he finds a loathing at every step. He can 
do nothing in the fine of supposed excellence pointed out 
to him: he begins to doubt his powers; and sinks into des- 
pondence. 

How little is there of solid excellence , of the genuine 
ore 5 ?n most of the English Poets of fame — (at least of 
temporary fame, ) — who have died in the last thirty years. 
They have as little applicable to the illustration of high 
morals , as they have of powerful and extended invention I 
I put Beattie and Cowper among the first : but Beattie 
was perhaps too much cried up in his day; and has been 
too much neglected since. His Minstrel already flags sadly 
in the second Book : and yet it is a Poem less than half 
finished ; leaving all the main part , in which the trial of 
genius would have been placed, undeveloped. It is the re- 
ligious Sect to which Cowper belonged, that has given him 
an extraneous popularity. Yet he had much of the ore of 
a true poet ; though he was sometimes flat and insipid ; 
and sometimes sickly. The seclusion caused by his morbid 
health had been a bar to those diversified mental riches , 
which give full vigour to genius. In the last forty years he 
had neither read enough ; nor knew enough of what was 
passing in the world. 

What shall we find in the most modern poetry of England, 
either to exemplify great moral truths, or to develop those 
magnificent or beautiful visions , which are the continual 
visitants of high fancies ? Kow is our knowlege of the se- 
cret movements of the human heart improved by it ? 

It is the pursuit of false beauties , which is the bane of 
these productions. — Their inventions, are not fictions to 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 11 

illustrate Truth ; hut to set up Falsehood ! This is the 
species of originality, which they seek; and in which they 
succeed. They are unlike, therefore, those who have pre- 
ceded them ^ ex necessitate rei; for diversity, not propriety 
or probability , is their aim . The readers then , who 
contract a habit of admiring them , must , by obvious 
consequence , believe that they for the first time have disco- 
vered the genuine fountain of Poetry ! 

It is the wrong meaning attached to the word Fiction , 
which perpetually misleads the poetical theorist , and the 
Public who follow his dogmas. It is assumed , that Fiction 
means something different from what exists in the mate- 
rial or intellectual world : — indeed for the most part the 
latter is forgot ; and it is supposed that it can only refer 
to the former. What is it ? Not a copy of an individual 
archetype ; but invented as an illustration of the genus ! 
If it illustrates no genus ; — but solely the capricious 
combinations of the author's head ; wherein is its value ? 
It wants one of the primary ingredients of poetical excel- 
lence , Truth ! 

It is easy to invent in this w^ay, when tlie inventor is 
bound by no rules ; nor is constrained to pay attention to 
any likeness. These are not lusus Naturce; but lusus Artis\ 
of which the pleasure ceases with the cessation of the 
Novelty ! — The same observations apply to language as 
to matter : for every one knows there are poets of lan- 
guage , as well as poets of matter. Improbable and 
unnatural ornaments are as objectionable , as improbable 
and unnatural matter. Yet each catch the depraved taste 
of the multitude ; and are practised by writers of minor 
genius , for the same reasons. 

It is not surprising , that as long as Poetry resorts to 
these tricks , men of solid understanding reject it as a 
trifling Art. It thus deals in a factitious splendor j a glare 



12 THE ANTI- CRITIC 

of unchaste colours , which only raises the admiration of 
the weak and the uninformed ! It is sickly and revolting 
to the sound and vigorous mind. 

He , who has a just esteem of wisdom , who has a generous 
glow of heart , that feels grateful for pleasures , which are 
among the highest humanity can receive , cannot repress 
indignation at abuses which bring the noblest of Intellec- 
tual Arts into contempt ! 

Among those to whom the test of ages has assigned the 
place of great Poets, not a single instance can be produced , 
in whom the guiding en4owment of a powerful understan- 
ding was not added to the active gifts of strong fancy and 
high invention ! In their writings are to be found the 
deepest axioms of moral wisdom , the justest exhibitions 
of the human character , and the nicest and happiest dis- 
plays of the emotions of the human heart ! — Nothing is 
exaggerated; no combinations are formed _, but such as are 
in unison with probability, and the laws of Nature, mate- 
rial or intellectual. 

The variety of great gifts and acquirements , that is re- 
quisite to excellence in this high course of ambition , need 
not be insisted on. It is not wonderful therefore that the 
generality of candidates should resort to easier paths , by 
which they flatter themselves they shall mount the same 
ascent. It happens , that the Temple , which they behold 
at the top , is not the true one : but they flatter them- 
selves that it is so ; and if on their entrance they find 
there neither Homer , Virgil , Dante , Petrarch , Ariosto , 
Spenser , Tasso , Shakespeare , nor Milton , — instead of 
being tanght their mistake by this deficiency, it only aggra- 
vates their self - delusion , and eclipses their former hope 
of equality by the mad supposition, that they are superior 
to these immortal men , and have gained an admission 
which has been refused to their predecessors ! 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 13 

It is both by wrong rules , and by the misconstruction 
and misapplication of right rules , that the aspirants justify 
their false efforts. They mistake not only the words, jiction , 
invention , and originality, but the objects of imitation. 

It is said , that Truth cannot be the aim of poetry, be- 
cause , for intance , in the representation of the scenery of 
Nature , or of the human form , the best poet would give 
either a selection from it , or an improvement of it. But 
here the mistake lies in the assumption of an improper 
object of imitation. It is not the Poet's business to give a 
picture of the material object : this is the business of the 
Painter. It is the purpose of poetry to represent the image 
which exists in the mind, which is formed of a compound 
from what is received by the external senses , and from 
what is supplied by the internal sensation and reflection. 
The picture thus formed is something very different from 
the external object. The mind adds , omits , selects ; it 
enriches by sentiment; it elevates by intellectual associa- 
tions. The laws of our Being are so uniform , that in 
minds of similar temperament , and similar cultivation , 
these intellectual processes operate for the most part in a 
similar manner , and produce similar impressions : the diffe- 
rence is only in the degree of their vividness. 

But of what mental picture is the description of the false 
poet an imitation ? If it be the imitation of any mental 
picture at all , it is of a picture produced by the capri- 
cious labours and forced artifices of one who strives to be 
singular , and to divest the movements of his in,tellect and 
his heart from their natural paths ! His picture therefore 
wants the primary quality of poetry — truth. 

We hear a great deal about the flowers of poetry. Flowers 
are very well in their place, and in their due proportion : 
but we must not have all flowers : there is a medium in 
every thing : est modus in rebus . : they are sickly , when 



14 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

they are combined with no fruit ; when we have nothing 
but flowers. To speak frankly , any affected display of 
them instantly destroys the charm ; and is inconsistent 
with that real inspiration y which engrosses the genuine 
poet too much to permit him to occupy his attention in 
seeking after superfluous ornament. 

Of those , who have not taken erroneous roads , but 
have failed to rise above mediocrity for want of adequate 
powers , the instances , even among those who have ha4 
.the good fortune to be enrolled as poets , are numerous. 
Of Johnson's Poets , more than one half are of this kind. 
Many are mere versifiers. 

A versifier is one , who puts words into raelre , when 
there is nothing poetical either in the matter , or the lan- 
guage : when there is no vigour of thought ; no happy image 
to give interest and novelty , to what is trite ; no mark of 
a mind fervid with the presence of the idea which it un- 
dertakes to convey. A cold and naked conclusion of the 
understanding , drawn without either fancy or sensibility , 
or in the absence both of fancy and sensibility , is certiainly 
not poetry , however harmonious may be the metre in 
which it is expressed. 

Of two minds equally formed by nature , discipline and 
habit will give the final powers and final productions of 
one a very different character from those of the other. If 
the various faculties, and gifts of fancy, invention, unders- 
tanding, and sensibility, be originally equal, that will at last 
be predominant which is most cultivated. I attribute a 
great deal of the cast of such of Pope's productions, as are 
less poetical , to this cause. It would be too much to say ^ 
that Nature had endowed him with as sublime or copious 
an invention or fancy , as Milton or many others. But his 
occasional displays in those high deparments leave no room 



MODEHN TASTE IN POETRY. 15 

tb doubt , that lie might have conducted those faculties 
into an extraordinary and constant display of splendor. 

Bui is it desirable , that all should cultivate the same 
faculties , and expend their efforts in the same way ? 

Pope had the option of different modes of turning the 
stores of opinions and sentiments v^hich he had collected as 
a moral philosopher, to the purposes of his Art. He might 
embody them in an invented story , in which the conflic- 
ting characters might gradually unfold them in action; — 
or he might follow the manner of the prose philosopher , 
in delivering them as abstract axioms , in which the poetrv 
•would consist in the language , the illustrations , and the 
metre , aided by the vivacity , the vigour , the ingenuity , 
or the novelty of the thought. He chose the latter : pro- 
bably as best suited to the powers, which he elected pre- 
eminently to cultivate. Had he chosen the first mode , and 
executed it equally well , it can scarcely be disputed that 
he would have been a still greater poet. 

The consequence of the high excellence , to which he 
raised the department he cultivated , was to withdraw 
the taste of the Nation from all those more inventive , 
more wild , more visionary classes of poetry , in which 
Spenser and Milton , following the Italian school , had 
attained such splendor. Men, who could imitate Pope's 
Art , but who had none of his more noble endowments 
to give soul to it , took possession of the public mind , 
and domineered over it with the insolence of ill-got power. 

At this time Collins and the two Wartons were reaching 
manhood. Their talents were cast in a different mould; and 
the father of the two last^ who had been Poetry-Professor 
at Oxford, had imbued them with an early admiration of 
the rich and romantic imagery of Milton's juvenile poems. 
The original and dominant genius of Collins, independent 
of accidental bent , led him the same way. 



THE ANTI-CRITIC 

They found that the public mind was closed to all merits 
of this sort ; that what is called good sense in verse was 
the only excellence in which it could feel pleasure , or to 
which it could gl-ve praise. They concei\ed the chivalrous 
scheme of diverting the national taste into more varied 
and higher fields of intellectual excursion. They attributed 
to Pope the evil of having by his brilliant example pro- 
duced this narrowness of taste. He therefore was chosen 
to be the subject of examination and dissection. When 
the tide is running strongly one way , it requires severe 
and extraordinary efforts to counteract it. It is possible, 
that Joseph "Warton in his Essay on Pope went a little too 
far ; but as his taste was exquisite ; as he was a rich and 
varied scholar , and a benevolent and amiable man , he 
has made a Book. , which will never cease to delight the 
cultivated mind. The power of that Book is proved by 
the influence it had on opinions not only become habitual 
by long prevalence , but naturally roost congenial to the 
modes of thinking of the mass of mankind , engaged in 
the business of life , in its cares and necessities. 

The PLibllc opinion has since gradually taken an opposite 
turn ; and at length gone much farther into the opposite 
extreme. To expose what was the species of excellence, 
which Pope neither attained , nor indeed sought , is no 
longer necessary or useful: still less is it; necessary to 
draw harsh inferences as to his want of power in depart- 
ments , in which perhaps there Vv^as only a want of will. 
Mr. Campbell ar.d Lord Byron ha\e done well in taking 
V'^^ the gauntlet for him, I feel a conviction , that the con- 
clusion to which each of them has come on the subject 
is n^alnly right. 

It is the nature of the general taste to be always pas- 
sing bcckwards and fcrwrrds between extremes. It has no 
moderation ; it deals in excesses and extravagances. Un- 



MODERN TASTE W POETRY. 17 

bounded admiration is followed by equally unreasonable 
loathing; and in proportion as a name has once been lifted 
too high, it is afterwards sunk, too low. 

It would not be difficult to find in men of the most 
unrivaled genius some particular menial quality, in which 
they have been exceeded by many very inferior to them. 
It is the combination , the management , the proportion , 
the result of the whole , which confers the final superio- 
rity. It matters not by what processes they arrive at ex- 
cellence. The excellence must be weighed as an whole ; — 
not by the predominance of a particular ingredient. Proba- 
bly there exists not a more perfect poem of its kind , than 
the Eloisa to Ahelmxl : and let it be remembered that it 
is of a very high kind. It possesses every requisite of poetry 
in the highest degree. Here Pope certainly takes the cha- 
racter of an Inventor. Here is glowing imagery, pathos , 
sublimity , harmony , language elegant finished and per- 
fect beyond example. Where would Pope stand , if he had 
written nothing else .^ Can inferior productions by the same 
author draw down this from its place ? 

Yet the love of wonder , of mystery , of exaggeration , 
of capricious invention , which has lately seized the public 
attention , makes even such animated and inspired produc- 
tions, appear tame and without interest to its factitious , 
unnatural , and depraved appetite. It cannot exist upon 
simple and sober food : it requires pungent irritations. 

Is Truth exhausted ? Are we necessitated to wander into 
the fields of the false Necromancer for entertainment and 
instruction? So far from- it, tha!^ all, which has been done 
by all the best poetry of all the Nations of the vrorld, has 
still left the greater portion of the subjects proper for this 
Art ungathered. But the fact is , that it is easier to form 
fantastic wreaths of artificial flowers , than to gather and 
work into perfect shape living ones. It costs less to con- 



18 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

tra»t the colours, and give tliem a glare, which , howeTcr" 
unchaste, is to common eyes more attractive. 
Johnson has nobly said of Shakespeare , that he 
Exhausted worlds \ and then imagined new. 

The former part of this praise does not belong to our 
modern poets 5 and if they have attempted the latter , it 
has been after a mode of their own. They have paid no 
regard to the principles of human nature , and the pro- 
babilities which the mind of man requires. It is admitted, 
that a desire is implanted in us _, which is never content 
with the actual state of our Being. It loves to occupy itself 
in imagining an existence of more perfection; and poetry 
is never more happily or more properly employed than in 
describing these imaginations. But the principle on which 
they act is so uniform , that they pursue something like 
a congenial course in all cultivated intellects : and whatever 
is invented , not in conformity with these intellectual pro- 
babilities ; whatever does not find an echo in the general 
bosom , neither affords instruction , nor conveys legitimate 
pleasure. Monstrous combinations , such as cannot effect 
the momentary delusion of belief in sound minds , are always 
revolting to the wise ; and soon cease to excite the admi*" 
ration of the corrupted and the foolish. 

Jt is to genuine poetry that we must look for the va- 
luable part of human knowlege , to which we can apply 
our faculties. If 

« The proper study of manhind is man : » 

then it is to the pages of poets that we must first resort; 
for in them are delineated with the most force all the finer 
movements of the Mind. If the Mind be so constituted, as 
the most eminent of modern Psychologists have argued it 
to be , who can understand the intellectual part of human 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 19 

Nature so well as Poets? It is not cold Reason alone, wMcli 
constitutes the power , that governs human conduct. 

« Les moralistes de nos jours , » ( says Bonstetten in the 
Introduction to his Etudes de VHomme ), ne nous disent- 
lis pas que I'empire sur nos passions est le plus noble des 
empires : mais cette conquete ne peut se faire que par la 
connoissance intime de nous-m ernes. Les lois aussi qui font 
la destinee des nations ; et la grande charte de rhumaiiite _, 
que tous les hommes reclament, c'est dans le sanctuaire de 
Tame , c'est dans la connoissance de I'esprit humain , qu'il 
faut les chercher. 

» Et cependant rien n'est plus neghge de nos jours qiie 
I'etude de riiomme ! La raison en est , que rien ne ressemble 
moins a I'homme que le portrait qu'en on fait les philoso- 
phes, qui, dans leurs ideologies, n'ont jamais dessine qu'une 
partie de leur modele. Voyez I'homme dans les livres de 
philosophie rationnelle , et comparez le a I'homme tel que 
nous le Yoyons. Quelle difference entre I'un et.l'autre! 

» A ne voir que nos ideologies , on dirait que la pensee 
ne se compose que d'idees. On a regarde le sentiment comme 
iin hors-d'ceuvre de I'esprit humain , tandis qu'il en fait 
partie integrante. On ne lui a jamais assigne des lois cons- 
tantes. On a cru expliquer par le raisonnement ce qu'ou ne 
peut trover que par les faits. A force de raisonner , on a 
oublie I'etude des faits , tandis qu'il ne falloit voir que les 
faits. 

» Ij' imagination est la puissance motrive de I'esprit hu- 
main ; V intelligence en est la puissance dirigeante. L'homme 
actif le produit de la combinaison des deux forces; la dis- 
tinction des deux facultes est le resultat les plus important 
de la psycologie ». 

If there be nothing of excellence in the external image , 
or in the internal emotion , or in the combination of the 



20 THE ANTl- CRITIC 

two , or in the ingenuity and aptness of the observation ; 
or in the force or elegance or propriety of the language , 
in which they are expressed, then the writer merits not to 
be numbered in the class to which he aspires ; for 

mediocrihus esse poetis 



Non Dii 3 non homines concessere , etc. 

Still less deserving of distinction are those who are 
guilty of commissive faults ; those who deal in false 
beauties. 

But how happens it , that in so wide a field of contest , 
so few have attained excellence , so few been admitted to 
distinction ; and of the few admitted , that so many do not 
deserve the admission ? Of many , of whom a few compo- 
sitions have been executed with felicity , how much the 
larger portion are sunk by defects! Of most of our poets, 
not only of the earlier ages , but of the seventeenth Cen- 
tury , among a few good lines, continually recur long pas- 
sages ruined by poverty or coarseness of expression , by 
lameness in the collocation of the words , or the construc- 
tion of the sentences , by the absurdity of the images , or 
the extravagance of the thoughts. 

The obstacles must be great and numerous _, that so often 
defeat success. To make a good poem requires an union 
of high qualities , so various , as seldom to be found. 
It is probable that the absence even of one may be fatal 
to the result. 

But it seems to me , that the most common deficiency 
is in the sensibility ; « dans les profondeurs de Vdme ; dans 
la sensibilite , la force motiice. » All the talent , skill , and 
exertion in the world will not countervail this want. But 
memory, thought, knowlege , art, industry, are commonly 
called in , and produce abortions. When the soul is moved , 
the language in which it cloathes itself ,^ is always of a 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 21 

congenial character : affectation and over - ornament are 
certain proofs that the emotion is pretended. 

Some feel the true inspiration for a moment ; but the 
flame goes out; and left in the dark , they fall into ine- 
qualities , errors , and abysses. Some write from memory 
alone ; and therefore , though their productions may be 
fair in outward form , they want interest and life. 

For my part, I have no value for those writings, which 
have not the power 

« To wake the soul by tender strokes of Art , 
To raise the genius , and to mend the heart : « 

which merely exercise the reader's mind with the freaks 
of a wanton or a forced imagination ; which add nothing 
to the knowlege of the human character ; which develop no 
native passions; which beat no resemblance to what exists, 
or is believed to exist. Novelty at the expence of Truth 
gives but a base and short-lived pleasure. 

Imagination is not bestowed on us to erect phantoms , 
which mislead us from the contemplation of the magnificent 
and the beautiful , with w^hich Nature has illumined our 
minds ; which may seduce us into a factitious love of the 
visions of Falsehood! 

To give allurement to Vice, by representing it united with 
qualities with which it never can be united , is a perver- 
sion of the Author's genius , and the reader's attention. 

To whom do we constantly turn in our moments of 
soberness , of melancholy , or delight ? In Gray we find 
that , which satisfies all our faculties and emotions ; and 
all that accords with the theory of poetry, which I have 
laid down. His matter is drawn not merely from external 
images, combined with internal emotion; but the reflections of 
a mind , which has profoundly weighed the history of the 



22 THE ANTI-CRITIC ^ 

human character , are added to them. There is something of 
this in Thomson's Seasons ; but much less of it ; — and 
his diction wants the compressed vigour , and classical ele- 
gance of Gray : it is often diffuse and cumbrous ; while 
not infrequently his sentiments and thoughts are trite and 
ostentatious. Shenstone's defect is tenuity and sameness ; 
yet his Elegy on Jessy is a specimen of exquisite tenderness, 
purity , elegance , and harmony. 

But Gray is a Poet of one of the first ranks : Thomson 
perhaps approaching to them. Of all the minor Poets , 
Parnel is among those , who deserve the highest praise. 
His Hermit is as fascinating , as it is instructive ; which , 
without much force , or bold originality , partakes in due 
proportions of the essenlial ingredients of poetry. Of a 
still more vigorous and happy cast , though of less com- 
prehensive morality, is Prior's Henry and Emma. 

It is by embodying and bringing into action speculative 
views of human character , that the poet is performing his 
great task of Creation. Whatever stands insulated and abs- 
tracted from a series of actions _, must depend upon the 
force and happiness of combination of image , emotion , 
thought , and language. In these last consists principally 
Lyrical, Descriptive , and Didactic poetry. As an Epic Poem 
is the highest species of invented Tale ; so every Tale re- 
quires more invention than these last. But it is singular 
that the best of the second class of Poets have seldom 
aspired to this degree of invention : they have left it to 
their inferiors , who have relied more on the interest of 
the outlines of the Tale , than on the merits of the details 
with which these outlines were filled up. Perhaps they 
deemed it wiser to place their hope on the sterling ore of 
their materials , than on the claims of extended design : 
and that it was better to approach excellence in a minor 



MODERN TASTE m 1»0ETRY. 23 

department, than to stop at mediocrity in that, which was 
superior. 

It cannot be because the subjects of poetry are exhaus- 
ted, but because poets shrink from traversing the true 
paths , that novelty is sought in false directions. They per- 
ceive the difficulties > and escape into regions of singula- 
rity and wonder , where artifice and surprise may cover 
their want of native and simple strength. 

In looking back on the whole Body of English Poetry, 
how little is there , on a severe examination , which rises 
above mediocrity ; or of which the faults do not overweigh 
the merits. The true tone is caught for a few moments ; 
and then the author relapses into discord, or flatness , or 
absurdity. What a proof of the intensity of the powers which 
this Art demands ! How many can mount the air ; but 
how few can keep on the wing ! It is the fire within, that 
fails; and memory and effort cannot supply its place. False 
thoughts ; false metaphors ; the cold chilling airs of tech- 
nicality succeed ; the charm is gone ; and the exhausted 
poet falls to the ground. 

A calm research into the innumerable volumes of the 
Candidates for Poetical fame will furnish inexhaustible evi- 
dence of these assertions. It is the inequality of most of 
the aspirants , which has sunk them into oblivion (i). 

Such is the ill-nature of the world, that they remember 

(i) This appears to be the true reason, why so many volumes of 
English poietry, of which the authors have given occasional specimens 
of real genius , have been laid aside and forgotten : while those of 
others, wilh meaner qualities, but more uniformity, have survived. 
I can no otherwise account for the oblivion of many of the Lyrical 
Poets of Charles I's reign -.of Wither , Carew, Habingdon, Lovelace, 
Herrick, Stanley, L. Pembroke, Fanshaw, etc. Of each of these we 
can name one or two pieces, of which some are elegant and happy, 
and others exquisite ! 



24 THE ANTI- CRITIC 

the failures of an author , rather than his merits. Pope 
brought forth nothing , which was not highly laboured , 
and highly polished. All the management of an Artist 
appears, in addition to the power of Genius. It is perhaps 
by this maaagement , this economy of the native fire , that 
the means of endurance are preserved. 

Of that species of Poetry , which is preeminent in the 
display of the faculty of the. Understanding, in which the 
talent of reasoning of an acute and vigorous judgement 
is exerted , Pope's Essay on Criticism is in every respect 
one of the most extraordinary. In all that is technical it is 
nearly perfect. In denseness of matter it comprises more, 
than ever was pressed into the same space. Its lucid arran- 
gement is excellent. Its precepts are all just; and expressed 
with admirable perspicuity , elegance , and happiness of 
illustration. But they are not only just ; many of. them 
strike with a delightful novelty , from the felicitous force 
of the distinctions wliich they communicate- They are as 
comprehensive as they are minute ; and display that candor , 
solidity, and temperate wisdom, which entitle them to the 
character of eternal truths. Is it possible to reflect without 
increasing astonishment, when we consider that this pro- 
found and perfect composition was produced at the age of 
twenty ? It would be well for modern Critics to attend to 
the rules of this Essay! 

« If Wit so much from ignorance undergo 
Ah , let not learning too commence its foe ! 
Of old , those met rewards , who could excel , 
And such were praised , who endeavour'd well ; 
Though triumphs were to generals only due , 
Crowns v/ere reserved to grace the soldiers too : 
Now they who reach Parnassus' lofty crown , 
Employ their pains to spurn some others down ; 



MODERN TASTE IN POETRY. 25 

And while self-love each jealous writer rules , 
Contending wits become the sport of fools : 
But still the worst with most regret commend; 
For each ill author is as bad a friend ». 

But this age , which is so fond of bitter and relentless 
criticism , is as extravagant in its praises , as in its censu- 
res ( I ). Yet injudicious and excessive panegyric is surely 
rather hurtful than beneficial to its object, Mr. Campbell 
will scarcely thank his friend Fahlus (2) for the following : 

« It is not generous in your Lordship , nor yet just , to 
sacrifice all your cotemporaries to the angry Manes of Pope. 
There is , at least , one living Poet , who is as far supe- 
rior to Pope , both « in the thoughts that breathe , and 
words that burn , » as Pope is superior to Tickell. I accuse 
not your Lordship of envy ; your pride of genius must spurn 
the approach of a passion so humiliating. Tell us then what 
part of Pope's writings would supply the divinity, that breathes 
and speaks in every part of Oconnor's Child ? Will poste- 
rity indeed prefer the Eloise to Gertrude ; — the Rape of 
the Lock to the Exile of Erin ; and the Essay on Man to 
the Pleasures of Hope ? Pope was a poet ; a7id he possessed 
an eminent and rare claim to the title : he knew how to 
touch , retouch , polish , alter , and improve every line , till 
it was highly finished. It is not the selection of the indivi- 
dual, Antinous, but the perfect execution , that has « gathered 
into existence the poetry of the bust >k In the present age y 
your Lordship knows , that there is only one poet , who 
finishes; — - and his finishing , like his genius , is far supe- 
rior to Pope's ». 

(1) The greater part of the Living Poets, who are in fashion, are 
I believe , themselves writers in the most popular Reviews'. 

(2) Letter to Lord Byron ^ protesting against the immolation oj' 
Gray, Cosvper , and Campbell, at the shrine of Pope. 

4 



26 THE AlfTI-CRlTIC 

The same Critic has the following monstrous remark : 
« In the writings of Pope I look in vain for the genuine 
operation of feeling , — for the honest movements of the 
heart ; — for the real voice of nature , — for the true 
language of passion. All these appear in Pope like the image 
of the snow-clad trees in the icy lake. » 

It is a Discovery , that there is no passion in the Eloisa 
TO Abelard ; no movements of the heart in the Elegy on 
AN Unfortunate Lady ; and in the Dedication of Parnell's 
Poems TO Lord Oxford ! — 

It is in vain , that this Critic attempts to dispute Lord 
Byron's position , that « the highest of all poetry is ethical 
poetry, as the highest of all eat thly objects must he moral 
truth (i). This position stands on a rock ; perhaps Lord 
B.'s illustrations of it require to be a little more guarded 
and qualified. Mere moral truth does not constitute poetry : 
it must be moral truth conveyed in a poetical manner. Half 
the errors in modern judgements on this subject arise from 
the narrow notion , that good poetry must principally consist 
of imagery. 

Campbell in his <c Essay on English Poetry » , ( i ) says 
very happily : « IVhy try Pope, or any other poet , exclu- 
sively by his powers of describing inanimate phenomena ? 
Nature, in the wide and proper sense of the word, means 
life in all its circumstances , — nature moral , as well as 
external ». — « Pope's discrimination lay in the lights and 
shades of human manners , which are at least as inte- 
resting as those of rocks and leaves (2). In moral eloquence 
he is for ever densus and instans sibi ». 

It is true, that Man in society does not indulge those 
sublime musings , -which , if his mind be full of energy arid 

(i) In his LHler in answer to Bowles's Strictures on Pope. 
(i) Specimens of Brit. Poets, i. 24. 



MODER]?f TASTE IN POETRY. 27 

passion J he cherishes in solitude. The poet is confined to 
the study of a Being harder, coarser , and less intellectual. 
What belongs to the happiness of the Many , may be more 
useful than what belongs to the happiness of the Few : but 
we must not estimate the dignity of every thing merely 
by its common use ! 

We must appreciate a poetical subject, not by its ma- 
terial or immaterial quality; but ( whichever of these it be), 
according to the degree of its sublimity, its pathos, or its 
beauty. There is beauty in propriety , elegance, and har- 
mony of language joined to justness of thought : and when 
to the latter is added extraordinary vigour , it often rises 
to sublimity. In such consist the merit of no small pro- 
portion of the matter both of Dante , and of Milton. 

Yet it is clear thai Joseph Warton in theory, and Darwin 
both in theory and in practice, entertained the principle of 
the materialism of poetry. 

- Johnson has remarked (i), that there are « modifi- 
cations of life, and peculiarities of practice, which are the 
progeny of error and perverseness ; or at best of some acci- 
dental influence , or transient persuasion » , and , « which 
must perish with their parents ». Something of this kind dis- 
tinguishes every successive age of poetry from its predecessor. 
We have the Provencal style ; and long Moral Allegory ; 
the Epic Romance ; the Historic Legend; the Elisabethan 
pastoral ; the Metaphysical ; the Court Lyric both of Italian 
and of the French School ; the Satirist of life and manners ; 
the Descriptive and Didactive; the Lyric of Abstract Per- 
sonifications ; the Epistolary ; the Mock-heroic of domestic 
lie; the Delia Crusca tinsel; the Botanic fiction; the Gentle; 
the Simple; the Festive; the Mysterious; the Terrible; the 
Anatomical. 

In most of these the fault arises from exclusiveness ; 

i] In Lis Life of Butler. 



28 THE ATVTl- CRITIC 

from carrying a particular manner to excess. All original 
authors , like original painters , will be in some degree 
, mannerists ; but to rest the merit on the particularity , is 
a fatal error ! 

What is false , catches the multitude so much quicker 
than ^yhat is true ; and the merit of what is technical is, 
so much more easily apprehended by common critics, as 
well as by common readers , than the merit of native 
genius , that these peculiarities have at all times been among 
the sources of temporary fame. But Time has dispensed 
its judgements with an impartiality and propriety seldom 
mistaken. 

It is observable , that all those , who are placed by the 
test of posterity at the head of the list of English Poets, 
were men of great general powers of mind : such as 
Chaucer, Spencer, Milton, Cowley, Dryden , Pope , Butler, 
Prior, and Gray. These were all men not only of power- 
ful fancies , and great erudition ; but of acute and vigo- 
rous understandings. The prevalence of a particular faculty, 
uncontrouled or unenriched by others, never put a poet in 
the first , or even the second rank. We may best illus- 
trate this by instances of those , in whom the single faculty 
was most eminent. Thomson had a most vivid fancy; but he 
gives little proof of a very powerful understanding ; or of 
an heart of deep passion ; or even of invention , unless 
the Castle of Indolence may support his claim to it. Young 
had an acute intellect , sagacious in the observation of 
manners; flowing with sentiment; and enriched by imagery; 
but he wanted judgement : his pictures are all exaggerated, 
and over-wrought. There is in Alenside more of rhetorical 
flourish , than of genuine inspiration, Shenstone wants 
strength and comprehension of thought. Lyttelton is ele- 
gant and classical ; but he is deficient in originality , 
imagination , and fire. Dyer has had the singular good 



barttabee's journal. 29 

Ibrtime of placing himself justly among genuine poets by 
the production of one only lyrical piece , written apparently 
with great carelessness and ease ; and certainly wanting in 
the « limae labor : » I mean the delightful poem of Grongar 
Hill, His other compositions are unconquerably dull. 

No one now reads Gilbert West , though praised by 
Gray, ( who was almost always niggardly in his encomiums ), 
with a warmth that seems quite unaccountable. His 
Translation of Pindar entitles him to the fame of a scholar; 
of a man of great talents; and great as well as elegant, 
attainments. No one probably ever did read David Mallet. 

Let it be observed , that Chaucer , Spenser , Milton , 
Cowley , and Prior , were all Statesmen ; and that the 
opinions of Dryden , Pope , Butler , and Gray , were all 
exercised on Public Affairs. 

If we turn our eyes on Shakespeare , perhaps the greatest 
poetical genius , who ever lived , we shall find in his 
pages more moral axioms, more of that which is applica- 
ble to every- day life , than in those of all other poets 
united. 

Let us not then estimate poetry by its improbabilities ; 
its exaggerations ; and its deviations from reason ! Let us 
reject the false principles of Criticism , on which it has 
been assumed , that Pope was no poet ; and let us not 
so lavishly grant this honour to those , whose errors are 
set up as their claim to it ! 



III. 

BARNABEE'S JOURNAL BY RICHARD BRATHWAIT. 

Edited by Joseph Haslecvood , Esq. 
Among the minutiae of Literary Ilistorv , the appro- 
priation of that admirable and justly popular poem of 



30 THE A WTI- CRITIC 

Barnabee's Jom'nal [^ ov Drunhen Barnahee ") ^ to its true 
author, Richard Brathwait^ is one of the most singularj 
and does the highest credit to . the critical sagacity _, as 
well as to the unsparing industry and intelligence, of the 
fortunate discoverer , Mr. Haslewood , the last Editor of 
this droll and exquisite piece of pleasantry. ( See Gejit. 
Mag. vol. LXXXVIII. i. Sg. XCI. i. /,4o ). — 
. Richard Brathwait was iA son of Thomas Brathwait of 
Eurneshead , in the parish of Appleby, Co. Westmoreland, 
Esq. who died loio , by Dorothy , daughter of Robert 
Bindloss of Haulston , in the same County; and is suppo- 
sed to have been born at Burnshead , i588. In 1604, he 
became a Commoner of Oriel College Oxford, at the age 
of 16 : whence he went to one of the Inns of Court to 
study the law ; a science , which he neglected for poetry , 
and the Belles Lettres. Hence he retired into the country ; 
having been left by his fallier a provision in landed pro- 
perty. In 1617 , at the age of 29, he married a lady of 
a good family , who died i633 , and by whom he had 
nine children In the country he became , according to 
A Wood « Captain of a Foot - Company in the Trained 
Bands ; a Deputy-Lieutenant in the County of Westmore- 
land; a Justice of Peace; and a noted wit and poet ». 

At the end of six years , from the death of his first 
wife , he remarried Mary , daughter of Roger Crofts , of 
Kirllington , Co. York, Gent, (of Scottish origin), vrho 
owned the valuable Manor of Catterick in that County. By 
her he had issue the gallant sir Strafford Brathwait. 

To this Manor of Catterick our poet removed in the 
latter part of his life , and dying there 10 May 1673 , at 
the age of 85 , was buried in the church of that parisb. 
Ills wife survived him , till April 1681. 

Before he left his Inn of Court , he had already acqui- 
red the distinction of « one of the wils » of his day. Mr. 



Ni 



barnabee's joubiv^al. 31 



aslewood gives an enumeration of more than 4^ pubU- 
calions of his : the last in i665 : — the first, tiia Golden 
Fleece , in 1 6 1 1 . 

To most of these publications the author's name was 
affixeil ; and he was among the popular writers of his 
day : but these pieces became afterwards neglected ; and 
Wood with a sort of random and indiscriminate bitterness 
that he often indulged in the form of the same sterile 
expressions, which his dulness prevented lilm from varving, 
says, that in his time they were « sliglited and despised as 
frivolous matter , and only to be taken into the hands of 
novices w. . , - 

Neglect was followed by scarcity ; and all , except the 
Gentleman, and Gentlewoman , became unknown to Book- 
sellers' catalogues : and many of them for the first time 
were developed even to the most curious Bibliographers 
by the researches of the present Editor. ' 

In this slate stood the literary character of Brathwait, till 
within these ten years. The fashion of revising the acquahi- 
tance with authors of "^ the i6 ^^ and 17 ^^ centuries, once 
known but sunk by time into oblivion , drew a little 
notice to one or two of the Tracts of this writer. But 
from these it scarcely appeared that he rose above the 
quaintness and factitious ingenuity , which formed the 
temporary fashion of his age. There are always swarms 
of authors who have a secondary sort of talents , which 
can catch and exaggerate the prevailing mode , whatever 
it may be : but who^ when that mode goes out , lose all 
attraction. ^ 

A new Edition of Bamabee's Journal was now called 
for : and the superintendance of Mr. JJaslewood was asked, 
and granted. Late Editors had ascribed the work to an 
ideal person , one Barnabee Harrington , on the authority 
of a misconstrued passage. Mr. Haslewood was sure , that 



32 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

this was a baseless assumption; but he had yet no disco- 
very of his own , with which to supply its place. 

The Preface to the new Edition was already sent to the 
Printer , when Mr. H. seeing occasion to refer to Brathwait's 
Strappado for the Dwell, i6i5 , for the purpose of illus- 
trating an obscure passage , was struck with a similarity 
in the Apology for the Errata to those which occurred in 
Barnahee's Journal. A right clue once obtained runs and 
expands before the eye of energetic research , like wild- 
fire. 

Tract after Tract of Brathwait's scarce Pieces was exa- 
mined ; and still the same quaint and peculiar apology 
for the Errata was found in each. 

Another clue now suggested itself. In the Journal is 
this passage; (in Part III. p. 309 ), 

« Veni Darlington , prope vicum 
Conjugem duxi peramicam : >) 
« Thence to Darlington; there I boused y 
Till at last I was espoused. » 

Again : 

« Veni Nesham , Dei donum , 

In Caenobiarchae domum ; 

Uberem vallem _, salubrem t^enam , 

Cursu fluminis amaenam , 

Lsetam sylvis , et frondosam , 

Beras yultu speciosam. » 

« Thence to Nesham , now translated , 

Once a nunnery dedicated ; 

Vallies smiling , bottoms pleasing , 

Streaming rivers never ceasing , 

Deckt with tufty woods and shady .< 

Graced by a lovely Lady. » 



barnabee's journal. 33. 

Again : 

« Nunc ad Puclimund , prlrho flore , 

Nunc ad Neskam , cum uxore , 

Lseto cursu properamus , 

Et amamur et amamus ; 

Pollent floribus ambulachra , 

Vera veris simulaclira ». 

« Now to Riclimund , whence spring's comraing , 

Now to Nesham willi my woman , 

With free course we both approve it , 

Where we love , and are beloved; 

Here fields flower with freshest creatures 

Repreiienting Flora's features w. 

Mr. H. therefore procured a search to be made iii 
Darlington and its neighbourhood for the marriage of 
Brathwait. Iii the parish Register of Rurworth , in which 
parish Nesham is situated, a village about three miles fronl 
Darlington , was found the decisive evidence : the manage 
of Richard Brathwait with Frances daughter of James Lawson 
of Nesham Esq. on May 1617. — 

The identity of the author was no longer to be doubted. 
But the more the Editor examined , the more coincidences he 
found with peculiar passages in the acknowleged writings 
of Brathwait. 

The Edition containing this discovery appeared in 1818. 
D.** Bliss has since communicated the following confirmalion 
from the MSS of T. Hearrie, 

« The Book called Barnabas' Ramhles , printed in Latin 
and English, in-12.", was written by Richard Brathwaite ^ 
who writ and translated a vast number of things besides ,' 
he being a scribler of the times. But Mr. Bagford tells me 
that Mr. Chr. Bateraan , ( an eminent Bookseller in Pater- 



34 THE Al^TI-CRItld 

ftostci" Row ) , who was well - acquainted with some of the 
family , hath several times told him that Brathwait was the 
author of it. This Book is since printed (i) ». 

. In farther confimation Mr. Haslewood has discovered , 
that in a copy of the 2*d Edit, which belonged to Edw. 
Wilson Esq. of Dallam Tower , Co. Westmoreland , was 
Written the following note : 

« The author I knew , was an old poet, Rich. Brathwait, 
father of sir Thomas , of Burnside Hall , near Kendall in 
Westmorland (2) ». 

Mr. Haslewood by the aid of a variety of coincidences 
fixes the date of the Jirst Edition of Barnabee's Journa'' 
to i65o ; and by an ingenuity of circumstantial evidence 
discovers the Printer to have been John Haviland. 

Sixty six years then elapsed before a second Edition 
appeared. It had been published, anonymously ; and in this 
period the name of the author, which had probably long 
floated on the public breath , had been lost to the literary 
world. 

« In progressu Boreali , 

Ut processi ab Australi , 

Veni Banhery , o prophanum ! 

Ubi vidi Puritanum 

Felem facientem furem , 

Quia Sabbatho slravit murem ». 

« In my progresse traveling Northward , 

Taking my farewell oth' southward , 

To Banbery came I , O prophane one ! 

Where I saw a Puritane one, 

(1) The dale of this MS of Hearne is ijiZ. The words in Italic^' 
were afterwards added, and clearly allude to the reprint of 17 16. 

(2) Probably sou of Edw. Wilson , by lane daughter of Gawen 
Brathwait of Ambleside Esq. See Burn's Hist, of Westra. r. 227. 



barnabee's journal. 3^ 

Hanging of bis Cat on Monday , 
For killing of a Mouse on Sonday «. 

But why the author's name should not have come fortii 
at the Restoration ; why a composition of so much viva- 
city , such pure and unfailing humour , such elegant 
scholarship , so happily colloquial , so adapted to universal 
popularity, so fitted at once for the polite, the educated , 
and the common reader , should not , at a period so 
congenial to its political and moral opinions , come into 
full notice and reputation , remains to be solved ! 

That the Public had a taste for colloquial poetry and 
witty exposure of political character, is proved by the re- 
ception given to Hudibrns, of which the Three First Cantos 
appeared in i663. It is not meant to compare Barnabee's 
Journal with this extraordinary production ; for there is 
an essential difference in their features , materials , and 
manner. Barnabee's distinction is simple , easy humour : 
Hudibras is almost over-abundant with original and profound 
wit; with deep knowlege of the perversities of human 
nature ; with exhaustless allusions to abstruse learning ; 
with sagacious observations on the conduct of man in so- 
ciety ; with axioms , which are become proverbial ; with 
images , of which the felicitous and unexpected similitude 
never loses its brilliance. 

Brathwait not only survived the Restoration thirteen 
years; but still continued to write and to publish. But he 
was , at this epoch , arrived at the age of 78 ; and perhaps 
he thought that the Journal betrayed too much levity for 
years so far advanced : it is true that at the period of 
pubUcation this objection was in some degree in force i 
but the two first Parts at least seem to have been written 
in early youth ; and perhaps the poet then trusted to thg^ 
concealment of his name. 



36 



THE ANTI-CRITIG 



On the whole, I am inclined to attribute the neglect 
and oblivion, into which this poem soon fell, to that 
very Restoration , by which it ought to have been drawn 
into full life. All the literature of the preceding twenty 
years was then indiscriminately forced into one common 
grave : the dead and the living were buried together. The 
violent change, which took place, made it the fashion to 
^reject every thing , that had before prevailed. All , which 
could interest , must be now not only gay; but French 
gaiety. Perhaps the Latin, ( however light and happy ) , of 
Barnahee , was enough to make him be considered pedantic. 

In the same manner we must account for the simultaneous 
rejection of Lovelace , Stanley , Carew , Lord Pembroke , 
Herrick , and many others ; whose poems now ceased to 
be read , and were soon forgotten. 

But it is also very probable, that the author of Barnabee's 
Jouimal did not himself sufficiently estimate the value of 
his own composition. — I infer this from the character 
that more or less pervades all the other writings of Brathwait, 
with which I have had an opportunity of obtaining any 
acquaintance. In all of them is quaintness, pedantry, and 
a strong mixture of bad taste. They are the productions 
of a secondary kind of genius, stimulated into being by 
the hot-l^ed of temporary fashion : a sort of intermedia- 
tory of an accomplished and literary man of the world 
between the learned , and the mass of idle and busy society. 
Hence A. Wood's censure, that they were the delight of a 
former age ; the cast-offs of the better informed of that , 
which succeeded. Johnson says admirably , f< Those modi- 
fications of life and peculiarities of practice , which are 
the progeny of error and perverseness , or at best of 
^ome accidental influence , or transient persuasion , must; 
perish with their parents (i) «. 

(i) Poets. — Life of Butler. 



barkabee's journal, 37 

Perhaps 'Barnahee's Journal cost the author least pains j 
and he therefore thought it his worst performance. Cri- 
ticism , and the artificial rules of composition , are the 
things which often turn genius out of its path. A critic 
loves technical rules , because it requires neither taste , nor 
talent , to comprehend and apply them. He thinks things 
excellent just in proportion as they are artificial j viz. as 
they want genius ! 

What arises from the uninterrupted flow of a happy 
veiij, they have not the tact to appreciate. The natural 
association of images ; the sentiments which are their un- 
sought companions ; the simple diction , which does not 
overdress the thought , — these are the marks of that 
intrinsic power , that golden ore , which never loses its 
value. — And these belong to Barnabee's Journal! 

Yet Barnabee's Journal , tho' the work of a voluminous 
and well-practised author , lay forgotten for 56 out of the 
first QQ years of its existence ; and has been only partially 
revived, till within the last 16 years; while the hand, that 
wrote it , has been only discovered within these three 
years ! — - 

Still we are insultingly told , that nothing is forgotten , 
which deserves to be remembered : that the public taste 
is supreme : that it neglects not , thro' whim , or preju- 
dice , or dullness j that it praises not without adequate 
cause ! — 

If others do not go quite so far ; if they admit that the 
generous Public sometimes praises without reason , they 
insist that it never condemns to unmerited oblivion ! 



38 THE ANTI-CRITIC 



IV. 

PETRARCH'S INDUSTRY. 

In PetrarcVs Sonnets , taken together , is a course of 
high sentiment , and passion _, embodied I — The enthu- 
siasm of his love : the visionary circumstances , that it 
associates with all the incidents belonging to it ; — the 
ideal charms annexed to Laura's person ; her movements ; 
her feelings , — all partake of the nature of Creation , 
or Invention. — 

Petrarch's love of solitude ; and love of the spiritual 
World , mutually inflamed each other ! — 

He knew^ that his splendid faculties ought not to be 
w^asted on common-place affairs, which others could dis- 
charge as well as himself. — 

The greatest faculties must not expect to have all their 
strength at command wdthout industry and discipline. — 
Leisure , silence , calmness , unbroken attention , are requi- 
site. — Exercise operates surprisingly in the attainment of 
facility : ideas gradually develop themselves with clearness , 
that at first seemed involved in the darkest incomprehen- 
sibility. — 

« Magnas partes » , ( says our poet ) « rure ago , nunc 
etiam , ut semper , solitudinis appetens , et quietis. Lego , 
scribo , cogito ; hsec vita , haec delectatio mea est , quae 
mihi seroper ab adolescentia mea fuit. Mirum , tarn jugi 
studio , tarn pauca tanto in tempore didicisse ». 

If Petrarch , the most eloquent , fertile , and copious , 



MILTON. 30 

writer of his laboriotis and wonderful age could say this , 
what can a puny modern say ? 



V; 

MILTON'S SELF CONFIDENCE. 

No one ever executed a great work of intellect, without 
high self-confidence. 

But who can have this confidence, if his opinion is to 
depend on the capricious judgements of others ? Not only 
erroneous taste , but envy and jealousy, may cloud the 
judgements , that we suppose most free from them. 

Johnson says of Milton , that « it appears in all his 
writings , that he had the usual concomitant of great abi- 
lities , a lofty and steady confidence in himself ; perhaps 
not without some contempt of others ». But who can be 
compared with Milton ? 

The confidence will « come , and go » , in weaker minds : 
it will be a succession of provoking hopes evaporating in 
melancholy diffidences : active life will have been surren- 
dered ; but the substitute not enjoyed. It will not be as 
it was with the noble poet just mentioned. 

« I trust hereby », says he, « to make it manifest, with 
what small willingness I endure to interrupt the pursuit of 
no less hopes , than these ; and leave a calm and pleasing 
solitariness , fed with chearful and confident thoughts , to 
embark in a troubled sea of noise and hoarse disputes , 
put from beholding the bright countenance of Truth , irt 
the quiet and still air of delightful studies «, 



40 THE ANtl-CRITIC 



VL 
YOUNG'S UNIVERSAL PASSION; 



Young has endeavoured to prove, that Love of Fame 
is the Universal Passion : and to elucidate: it by a satirical 
poem , full of point and wit. The only difference is in the 
mode taken to obtain this ; and this is as diversified, as 
human character, and human action. 

Mankind , however , seem to have agreed , that the am- 
Ijition of intellectual excellence is among the most laudable 
of human impulses. 

But the road to Excellence is not always the road to 
Fame. 



VII. 
GRAY'S PURSUITS , AND HABITS. 



Is it to be lamented , that Gray wrote so little ? Did 
he make the due use of the talents conferred on him by 
Providence ? Is it not true , that 

« When in the breast the imperfects joys expire », 

when they are not embodied in language , and communi- 
cated , they are not only useless to others, but unsatisfac- 
tory to him , whom they have visited ? 



GRAY. 41 

What was the faculty, that Gray principaliy iemployed 
in reading ? If he only employed memory , he neglected 
the higher faculties, which he possessed! It is not sufficient 
to comprehend , and remember what others have written : 
it ought to be enriched by the reader's own reflections. 
The power of original thought improves wonderfully by 
practice : but he, who is occustomed to go in leading-strings, 
can seldom venture alone. 

It cannot be questioned that Gray could think for himself; 
and did think for himself on all great occasions. He thought 
not only powerfully, but rightly. His fault was fastidiousness. 
He was too little disposed to be pleased j and he exacted 
too rigid correctness. 



Who are of consequence ? Who have made themselves 
worthy of general notice , and general esteem ? Who have 
done that , which has not been equally done , or cannot 
be equally done , by a thousand others ? Could many others 
have written the Elegy \ the Ode on Eton College \ etc. of 
Gray? What is most excellent seems easy to be done : but 
the trial proves the contrary. 

There must be something of uncommon felicity in that 
to which we perpetually recur , after other things have 
lost all interest with the loss of novelty ! Is it the polish , 
and terseness of expression ; the happy selection of ima^^es ; 
or the simplicity, truth, and pathos of the sentiments? 



Gray, personally received but little of the incense of 
attention and praise, which the fame of his writings drew 
upon them. He mingled scarcely at all in that sort of so- 
ciety, who were fitted or disposed to estimate duly his genius. 

6 



42 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Jolmson lived in the full tide popularity : courted ; listened 
to J flattered ; worshipped. 



Gray ( I beleive ) says « a dead Lord only ranks with a 
Commoner ». — After death, the prejudices in his favour, 
which accompany him in life , are extinguished. He is exa- 
mined with the same impartiality , as any plebeian. 



In 'what consisted the difference between Gray , and 
Lyttelton ? 

Lyttelton had numerous advantages over Gray in the 
opportunity of seeing mankind ; in converse with the business 
of life ; and in that impulse and that skill, which are gene- 
rated by collision of intellects ! — But all these could not 
counteract the superiority of natural gift. 

In the internal construction of Gray's mind was vigor 
and fire. 

In that of Lyttelton, gentleness and facility, but feebleness. 
He had no invention : he was therefore not deficient in 
plain sense , because he was not exposed to be led astray 
by ignes fatuL But then in wanting force , he wanted that 
piercing sagacity, which gives to common sense its greatest 
use. 

Gray, in the unstimulating and drowsy ease of a College 
life , suffered the higher powers of his mind to slumber , 
and rust , while he was content to amuse himself by em- 
ploying his prodigious memory. Whoever reads his Letters, 
will be convinced that this is not too severe a censure. 

His serious Letters ( for his trifling ones sadly betray 
the affectations of a petit-maitre), give great interest, from 
the depth and accuracy of the knowlege , with which they 
are tinctured ; and the delightful skill of deep and perfect 



GRAY. 43 

scholarship, under the influence of pure, acute, and lofty 
taste. — 

But in the profusion of these treasures, we regret those 
still more valuable riches, which he seems too lazy to bring 
forth ! We have few of the results of his own original powers 
of thinking ! — He recalls to us the facts of history ; the 
opinions of moralists; the sentiments and images of poets; 
the explanations of scholars ; etc. but he seldom gives us 
his own thoughts , and theories. It is the evil , into which 
an unproportionate cultivation of memory leads the most 
powerful minds. 

But Gray could think powerfully ; imagine powerfully ; 
and invent powerfully ! — His Bard is a proof of his rich 
and sublime Invention I 

At the epoch at which Gray wrote, the powers of Invention 
seem almost to have ceased in English poetry : unless a 
few personifications and •allegorical abstractions, may be 
called Invention ; which Jos. Warton , when he wrote the 
Preface to his Early Poems , seems to have thought. 

I am not sure , that we have made, much improvement 
by the extravagant Inventions of modern days. 

And what Invention is there in the major part of the 
poets in Johnson's Collection ? Has Denham Invention ? Has* 
Waller Invention ? Perhaps a simile ; or a metaphor will be 
called Invention ! — There is more Invention in Butler : 
but he wants dignity of subject. Blackmore, Swift , Addison , 
Gay, Phillips, Savage , Somerville , Tickel, Hammond, Dyer, 
Mallet , Watts , etc. , want Invention. — Even Shenstonc 
cannot be said to have shewn Invention , unless in his 
Elegy of Jesse , « AVhy mourns mv friend ». 

I would give Dryden credit for Invention from the 
manner in which he has expanded the Tales of Boccacio ; 
and Prior, for his expansion of the Nut-Brown Mdid I — 
So Pope ,, for his Eloisa to Abelard ; and his Rape of the 
Lock! — 



44 THE ANTJ-CRITIC 

Collins is every where Inventive ! — Above all , in his 
Ode to the Passions ! I can discover nothing , on which I 
can found Akenside's claim to Invention 

Beattie's Minstrel entitles him to this distinction. But where 
shall we find it for Cowper ? Many of the Songs of Burns 
will entitle him to this praise. 

Mighty then, but prostituted name of Poet, to how few 
dost thou properly belong ? 



Was a man with the genius , erudition , and habits of Gray 
happy? His life was probably a mixture of extreme enjoy- 
ment , and bitter suffering. His hours of energy passed in 
pure and noble occupations ; lifted above worldly cares ; 
unpressed by worldly biasses : but man is yet a dependant 
being. His instinctive affections told him so : he exclaimed : 

t. 
f< Poor Moralist ! and what art Thou ? 

A solitary fly ! 
No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets I » 



His ardors must often have stagnated within him , for 
want of objects : cold fogs must have congregated over 
his heart : and have 

Frozen « the genial current of his soul ». 

The first quality of a poet is universally allowed to be 
Invention : the power of imagining new combinations of 
incidents or scenery ; and associating them with a lively 
description of the sentiments that would naturally be excited 
in such situations. Of the productions exhibiting an equal 
quantity of invention , those are the best , of which the 
ingredients are the most magnificent y or the most pathetic. 



GRAY. 45 

On this principle , Milton stands at the head of our 
poets — ( separate from the Dramatic ); — and Spenser next 
to him. Perhaps Chaucer stands third, in right of his Can- 
terbury Tales. 

If inyfntion be the character of a poet , how do those 
shew the characters , who are mere portrait-painters ? 

By selection of circumstances ; by picturesqueness of 
language ; by vividness of colouring. There is even in this a 
minor sort of novelty of combination. 



VIII. 
POETRY. 

Subjects of Poetry compared to distant Views. 
m^^^^^ 

« A step , methinks , may pass the stream ; 

So little distant dangers seem. 

%o we mistake the future's face , 

Eyed through Hope's delusive glass ! 

As yon summits soft and fair , 

Clad in colours of the air , 

Which , to those who journey near , 

Barren, and brown, and rough appear; 

Still we tread the same coarse way ; 

The present's still a cloudy day ». 

Dyer's Grongar Hill. 

It is the same with subjects of poetry : Matters of Fiction 



46 THE AlVTI- CRITIC 

are better described than matters of reality : because tbey 
are seen at a distance ; and without the barrenness and 
roughness , which are mixed up in actual life. He therefore 
who takes upon himself to describe his own circumstances 
and feelings , undertakes a task less congenial with the 
nature of poetry. 



IX. 

C O W P E R. 



The character of Cowper given by Campbell is very ele- 
gantly and discriminatively written. It observes accurately 
upon his want of invention : and upon the charm arising 
from portraiture ; viz. a delineation of self, when that self 
is full of simplicity and interest : of pure and virtuous senti- 
ment ; of moral rectitude ; of energetic inifignation of vice. 

But still compositions can scarcely be deemed to possess 
the higher qualities of ■ poetry , without invention. The 
power and gratification of imagining things more beautiful 
tlian reality is a quality implanted in our nature : and it 
is to satisfy this propensity, that the grand faculties of poetry 
are called forth. 

What is called the poetry of Reason may be very beau- 
tiful; but still it is not the highest kind of poetry. 

The ornaments of poetry may be applied to moral lessons, 
and practical sentiments : and they may illustrate and heighten 
the force and beauty of those lessons and sentiments : but 
there the poetry is subordinate to the matter; not the matter 
to the poetry. 



COWPER. 47 

By this test Cowper is inferior to Thomson, who, with 
not less exactness , has more invention in his descriptions 
than the other : and who has proved by his Castle of In- 
dolence , that he possessed an high degree of that faculty. 
The visionary talents of Collins rank him among poets of 
the true spirit. He saw ideal persons ; and endowed them 
with ideal souls. He gazed upon those undefined glimme- 
rings of imaginary Beings , which, like the glorious rays of 
the sunbeam , when it first comes in spring to make the heart 
glad, play involuntarily before the richly-stored, and highly- 
excited mind. When he addresses Fear , he is worked up 
as if that powerful Passion was actually personified before 
him. 

Burns also is in this respect superior to Cowper. Many 
of his poems, and songs, are upon imaginary subjects. 

Tom Warton scarcely shews it , except in his Crusade. 
Notwithstanding it has been denied , his Suicide was pro- 
bably suggested by the fate of Chatterton. 

Gray had invention : but he did not greatly exert it , 
except in his Bard. 

There are poets , who call up clusters of associations by 
a judicious selection of leading circumstances just hinted. 
This gives reason to infer that their own minds revel in 
accompanying creations : but they seem to shrink from the 
hazardous task of bringing them before the reader in the 
form of language. We give them credit therefore rather for 
what we think they might have done, than for what they 
have done. 



48 THE Al?ni-CRITIG 

X. 

CENSURES OF POPE. 

What arc the objections , made by censurers to the mora,l 
character of Pope ? 

That he was bitter and envious : 
That he was fond of money : 
That he was deceitful : 

That he had a mean admiration of the great ; though he 
affected to despre them : 

That he was vain of his wealth : 
That he was full of little artifices : 
That he was a secret plagiarist. 

That he was fond of indecences , and liis attachment to 
Martha Blount impure, etc. etc. 

All , or most , of these , seem to be charges made with 
a total absence of candour. 
. His satirical temper , and his indulgence of a deeply vin- 
dictive spirit for petty injuries to liis fame , appears to be the 
least defensible of his moral defects. It had been more noble 
to treat his assailants with an indignant contempt. He 
crushed them, and made them miserable with too unsparing 
an hand. 



TRUE PRINCIPLES OF POETRY. 49 

XL 
TRUE PRmCIPLES OF POETRY. 

We have two kinds of existence , or consciousness -~ 
Material — and Intellectual : — It is with the latter, that 
poetry is principally conversant. — 

Each is in truth in some degree mixed with the other : 
but as the one , or the other predominates , or originates , 
it takes the character of the predominator , or originator. 

For instance when outward objects are impressing them- 
selves on the material frame, they operate on the sensorium, 
which thus stirs and associates the new impression to ideas 
already there. 

And when the primary movement commences internally, 
it either recalls the images of what is material received at 
some former time from without , or admits the accession of 
their operation at the present moment from actual pre- 
sence. 

The whole conduct of the mind arising out of Material 
Consciousness appears to be different from that arising out 
of Intellectual Consciousness ! — While the outward objects 
are actually present, they of course make their impression 
according to their real and exact forms. They will not allow 
the imagination to select , nor to add. They therefore in- 
cumber his taste ; or confine his invention. 

But when these things are recalled thro' the fancy in 
absence ; when the movement originates with the mind , 
then the mind is the Master : it selects , or it adds , as it 
chooses. 



50 THE AJVTI-CRITIC 

The poet therefore, who attempts to describe objects from 
their actual presence , is sure to fail. There is an hardness , 
a confusion, a tiresome exactness about him , which destroys 
the charm of poetry. 

In truth the attempt is a strong presumption that the 
attempter feels not the genuine poetical talent. Sometimes it 
may happen that one really qualified may be misled by 
bad advice , bad example , or wrong system : but not 
often ! 

Perhaps it is the most distinctive mark of genius , that 
the movement originatjes from within ! 

This is a reason, why genius rejects all prescribed subjects; 
or executes them badly. 

The presence of an object upon the senses may be sup- 
posed to be a substitute for fancy : but it is not ! — 

There is a vast difference in the degree of strength and 
clearness , with which objects operate at the moment on 
different brains. Perhaps the memory of such objects may 
be in proportion to that strength and clearness : but it 
does not follow that the fancy is necessarily attached to it : 
that is , the power of recalling the image itself with as much 
vividness as if present ! — 

It is the vividness of emotion, caused by the presence of 
fancy, which is a peculiar and inseparable mark of genius. The 
skill of cold , labouring , Art can never be a substitute for it. 

But does not the presence of the objects themselves create 
the same emotion ? And why is this emotion nOt communi- 
cable thence , as well as from the power of the Fancy ? 

Perhaps the fire of an Intellectual image is more com- 
municable to an Intellectual process , ( which literary compo- 
sition must be admitted to be ) , than the fire of a material 
image ! 

The mind moves by its own impulses. There is a 'spirit 
within , that often sets it at work. It then makes use of 



TRUE PRINCIPLES OF POETRY. 51 

such of its stores as the occasion demands : and among 
them are images originally derived from material objects : 
but the p;resence of the material objects themselves has no 
concern With these movements. 

It is disguting to reflect how far-fetched and mistaken 
criticism has led poets astray from the real objects of the 
Art ! All the little technicalities , which were intended as 
adjuncts , have been deemed principals ! 



It is scarcely possible to describe , or delineate , all the 
degrees of Invention , of which the human mind is ca~ 
pable , or to which it is accustomed in its poetical occu- 
pations. 

A highly fertile and grand genius imagines or invents new 
orders of {Beings , and new worlds for their habitation. He 
creates them with grandeur , or beauty : and he suits him- 
self to the range and colour of belief, to which mankind are 
disposed. This is a task only undertaken by the very highest 
order of genius. 

Another , taking humanity itself as the material of his 
production , and the existing earth as its scene , elevates it 
by new combinations ; improves it by happy selection ; in- 
terests by grandeur , or pathos of sentiment ; surprizes by 
force of illustration, or delights by loftiness , force, harmony, 
and elegance of language. This is the result of a mind of 
splendid endowments always exercising itself in the culti- 
vation and disposition of the requisite materials. 

But there are numerous degrees of excellence far below 
these. 

When there is not strength or perseverance to invent 
an whole story , detached portions , or single figures may 
be invented. Or the invention may he confined merely to 
the illustration j to the simile , figure , or metaphor : or 



52 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

even to the polisli of tlie diction , or the harmony of the 

verse. 

Some minds employ themselves in seeking imagery ; and 
some in sentiment ; and some in elucidating the deductions 
of reason. 

If nature has been bountiful to them in the talents re- 
quisite for the pursuit to which they addict themselves , 
they strike out by long toil useful and sometimes brilliant 
truths , or at least amusing pictures and instructive eluci- 
dations. 

It must be on some of these minor results , that the 
majority of the lesser poets must build their claims to the 
laurel. 



This comprehensive view may perhaps let in even the 
Metaphysical poets. For these writers , always ingenious , 
though often absurd , and generally tasteless , frequently 
illustrated a moral truth , or a chain of reasonings by similes , 
or figures, which, however far-fetched, were striking, and 
abundant in reflection. 

It could only have been in the intellectual part of their 
consciousness that these fruits were produced. They must 
have cultivated a constant habit of turning inward ; and 
keejjing their mental faculties in great activity. 

Sometimes it was not accuracy, or the unexpected likeness 
of the illustration , that pleased : but something in which 
the extravagance of the comparison may be forgiven for 
the gallantry of the compliment : but more especially for 
the beauty of the imagery ; the sweetness of the expression ; 
and the music of the verse. Such as in Carew's Song : 

« Ask me no more , where Jove bestows , 
When June is gone , the fading rose ». 



TRUE PRINCIPLES OF POETRY. 53 

These are , however , rather the misapplications than 
the proper employments of poetical minds. In these devious 
courses some unexpected beauties will occasionally burst 
upon us ; and some unlooked-for fruit occasionally be 
furnished : but much labour has , notwithstanding , been 
lost. 



In different periods of society, the human mind employs 
itself in search of different fruits. Man is imitative ; and 
few have the boldness to chalk out a road of their own. 

In one age an image is deemed sufficient to fill the mind 
by its own simple grandeur : in another, fashion places the 
interest in the decoration of it : or in its use to adorn , 
or explain , something abstract , or in most respects dissi- 
milar ; and discovered in some one point to be unexpectedly 
like. 



In proportion as the ideas in which the composition deals, 
are complex , is the force of any particular quality of genius 
less apparent , and less requisite. — 

The Metaphysical poets therefore , and those quaint wri- 
ters , who formed the class that immediately succeeded them , 
were generally men of considerable talents and acquirements, 
but of minor genius. 



The understanding is generally employed in studying and 
teaching the nature and due regulations of our material 
existence ; or consciousness. 

It is the business of poetry to represent our Intellectual 
existence , or Consciousness. If therefore it occupies itself 
principally in instructing us in the former, it descends from 
its due sphere. 



54 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

If we wish to represent things in the order and with the 
accompaniments in which they strike the outward senses , we 
cannot represent them poetically, because when the fancy 
renews the representation of them , it does not represent 
them in the same order , and with the same accompaniments. 

As all poetry is addressed , or ought to be addressed , to 
the Fancy, it follows that what is not suited to the nature 
and rules by wliich the Fancy acts , can never produce 
the proper effect , nor be genuine in its character , or 
quality. 

That , which does not strike at once , but of which 
the meaning is to be attained by laborious deduction , is 
not poetry. 

That , of which the leading circumstance is not seized , 
or in wliich the attention is distracted by a detail of more 
than the leading circumstance , is not poetry. 

The more servile , or faithful , the picture is of material 
or real life, as it actually is _, the less poetical it is. Because 
this is not the picture , which is left upon the mind when 
the material objects are removed. 

When the understanding , when complex reflection , comes 
in to disturb the natural order and simple colours of the 
images , as they voluntarily rise in the mind , the effect is 
someling artificial, for which the mind of the reader was 
not prepared. 

There is no end to the varieties of aspect generated by 
the capricious judgements of the human intellect long pon- 
dering on the same subject; and losing sight of the point, 
whence they set out , in endless labyrinths. 

It is the essence of little minds to love artifice ; because 
the attainments of Art are within their reach ; whereas the 
deficiency of natural endowments cannot be supplied. 

It may be worth while to endeavour to try these theo- 
ries by the test of experience. How do they appear to be 
illustrated by the actual conduct of the greatest poets? 



TRUE PRINCIPLES OF POETRY. 55 

What are Dante's subjects? Are they not the visions of 
the mind ? And does he not present them characterized , 
and grouped, in the manner in which they appear to the 
Fancy ? 

The force of the images presented by his fancy , or created 
by his genius, gave him a confidence in its power, that 
rested satisfied without an effort at ornament , or exagge- 
ration. 

Does not the same character belong to Mihon? 

A Didactic Poem then is a contradiction. It has for its 
aim to do that , which is the reverse of poetry. 

But are there no poetical passages to be found in Didactic 
Poems ? — Yes : but then they are not Didactic : they are 
ornamental patches, incongruous with the professed object 
of the Work ! 



If this theory be true, does it raise, or depreciate the 
dignity and use of poetry ? 

Many will pronounce that it depreciates , because they 
will say , that in this character , it does not come home 
to the business of life I 



If poetry be a representation of our intellectual cons- 
ciousness , not of our material , that is , of those images 
which exist in the mind , not of the external images them- 
selves , it seems to me that when these images are origi- 
nally derived externally thro' the senses , they do not take 
their proper form and character , till the original is entirely 
removed from them. 

The fancied image is therefore a renewal, at some period 
separated from that when it was first impressed. In the in- 
terval , all the degrading and puzzling details sink away ; 



56 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

and leave none , but the striking or characteristic features 

of the image. 

It would seem that the same principle is applicable not 
only to those images which had their origin in something 
external , but to all the operations of the mind , whether 
imagery , sentiments , reasonings , or reflections. Poetry 
deals , or ought to deal, with them in the state, in which 
Fancy renews them — when the striking parts remain , and 
the dregs have sunk ! 

We arrive at a conclusion by a laborious process of ra- 
tiocination. We look back upon it at a mature interval : 
the result , the building remains : the scaffolding has dis- 
appeared. 



The nature of the human mind has been in all ages a 
difficult study. Locke made great advances in these fields 
of subtle enquiry ; and in our days Reid , Dugald Stewart 
and others , have made still farther advances. There are 
probably mysteries in it , which the human mind is inca- 
pable of conquering. 

I assume the fancy to be that faculty , which has the 
power of bringing before the eye of the mind any image, 
as if it had a material shape. It matters not , whether the 
materials , or likeness of that image , were originally bor- 
rowed from some external object; or whether by some ins- 
crutable cause , they originated in the mind. 

I assume Invention to apply to such of these Images brought 
before the mind's eye , as have not their archetypes in exter- 
nal material objects : whether the difference arises from no- 
velty of combinati m\ only , or novelty of the whole. It is 
obvious that this may apply to a single image , or a com- 
bination of images — to an Allegorical Ode, descriptive 
of a single ideal Being, or to an Epic Poem. 



PROPER OBJECTS OF AUTHORS. 67 

Memory is the consciousness of what has been ; not the 
image of it renewed to the mind , as if present. 

Fancy may make a poet : but the addition of Invention 
is necessary to make a poet of the highest class. 

And the fancy must deal in images , either beautiful , 
pathetic , or sublime i 

Can we name a poet , of well established reputation , who 
is a contradiction to this theory? 

At various periods of the literature of every Country an 
attention to these principles has not been duly preserved. 

As soon as poetry began to be cultivated as an Art, Art 
too often got the better j and substituted the adjuncts for 
Principals. 

Memory was exercised , instead of Fancy; and things there-^ 
fore , that were inconsistent with the essence of poetry j 
formed the materials of productions, which had nothing of 
the character of poetry but the metre. 



XIL 
PROPER ORJECTS OF AUTHORS. 



Ill addition to the inexhaustible subjects of intellectual 
observation , which still leave the field open to candidates 
for literary fame , after all the ground that has been takeri 
by their predecessors , every thing offeirs something pecu- 
liar to itself, and arising out of its: own circumstances; and 
consequently not presented to the literati of a prior date. 

There are also some colours of language, and some elu- 
cidations of sentiment , in which every age advances , and 
improves upon another^ 



58 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

The very change of language , the very novelty of arran- 
gement, sometimes restores the fatigued atlezitioh to an useful 
subject. 

He, who talks of his exclusive admiration of old writers, 
either is a pedant; or merely makes this a pretence to hide 
his distaste of all reading. Men of very high genius rise 
seldom in the course of centuries : but men not only of erudi- 
tion, but of genius sufficient to instruct and delight their 
cotemporaries , are to be found in every generation : and 
these are men , without whose efforts the intellectual state 
of society would rapidly deturpate ! 

If there were no place , but for such great men as Dante 
and Petrarch and Milton, one must despair. But there are 
very many seats , far indeed below these ; yet lofty enough 
for a noble ambition ! 

There is a great difference between the sense appHed to 
general truths ; and the sense applied to individual expe- 
diency. The wisdom of the former extends the fame of men , 
where they are personally unknown : — Of the latter, 
confnes it to those who are witnesses of the success of their 
individual conduct. The latter have a tact of hitting on what 
is most for their own interest ; which is often the reverse of 
general justice , or general expedience. But how few tiouble 
themselves with the love , or pursuit , of abstract truth ! 

It is probable , that the exercise of literary genius is nearly, 
if not intirely, independent of situation in life. Yet Biography 
relates all the circumstances of the life of a man of genius , 
as if they formed the essence of the knowlege we wish to 
have of him. 

A genius in poverty and disgrace consoles himself that 
he shall appear to the world only in his ideal character. 
The tasteless Biographer tears off the veil ; and shews him 
in all the nakedness of revolting reality. 



PROPER OBJECTS OF AUTHORS. 69 

The Public may love gossiping stories ; and to gratify 
a prurient curiosity, by an admission into the penetralia 
of private life. But respect for the person commemorated 
is as little the object, as it is in general the consequence, 
of these minute communications. 

There is a certain sort of wise and dignified generalisation 
in almost all the best-written lives of men of genius , or 
literature. Bos well descended from this in his Life of Johnson : 
Gibbon was a little inclined to descend from it in his Memoirs 
of Himself, . 



What are the proper purposes of authorship, and how 
they are to be executed, we are arrived at too late a period 
of literature to discuss. 

But to communicate truths important, yet not trite, in lan- 
guage which unites force with elegance , must be admitted 
to deserve well of the Public. 

Labours short of this may merit encouragement and praise. 
Whoever conveys useful instruction , or innocent amusement 
to the mind , does well. 



The world is inclined to consider those , who pursue 
their amusements rather than their private interests , as 
foolish , or unprincipled. But it ought , before it decides , 
to know what those amusements are; and to examine the 
character of them. With some, it is an amusement to ad- 
minister to the innocent and refined pleasures of the Public ; 
to attempt to enlighten their understandings; or to exercise 
their fancies and their hearts by beautiful images, or amiable 
emotions. 

Men amuse themselves with equipages , horses , hunting 
building, society, farming, etc. — is it a crime to amus« 



60 THE ATfTl- CRITIC 

themselves with that, of which the essence consists in con- 
veying pleasure or instruction to others ? 

If no one were to look beyond Self, what a battle of 
pri-vate interests would the world be? It is the detachment 
from self, that purifies us ; exalts us ; and makes us worthy 
of the love and admiration of others. 

The difference between duties , of which the results are 
immediate both with regard to persons and time, and those, 
of which the results are , in both those respects , distant ^ 
it may be difficult to estimate, or even to define. 

The productions of literary genius are for the most part 
of this sort. It will be asked, if they are a sufficient coun- 
terbalance to the omission of more practical and direct 
duties. 

Some of us come into the world to do nothing : some , 
destined to the highest tasks : some , to perform great pracr. 
tical works : some, to pursue 

« The shadowy tribes of thought! » 



When the Public are too stupid, or too negligent, duly 
to estimate a man's honourable principles of action , can he 
set them right by explanation? If we suffer ourselves to be 
at the mercy of every momentary breath of popular taste , 
we must lose all self- confidence ; and throw away our 
efforts in the most wavering irresolution. 

However it may be denied , no man of sound judgement 
can doubt , that Milton received little admiration , or notice 
in his own day, as a poet. Collins obtained no marks what- 
ever of fame or distinction. 



The representations of the moral , the intellectual , and 
|he material world, are so blended in every true producr 



PROPER OBJECTS OF AUTHORS, 61 

tion of poetical genius , that Art can never reach these 
impressions ; and neglect can never obliterate them , where 
nature has implanted them. They have a vivacity, a variety, 
an inequality , a freshness ; vv^hich those , who work by 
rules , never catch. 

Moral knowlege ought , unquestionably , to be the first 
pursuit of the human intellect : but deep moral wisdom 
was never yet obtained except from the pen , or the lips , 
of Genius. — Genius only can pierce the recesses of the 
human bosom ; and irradiate its clouds : Genius only can 
find due language, in which these discoveries can be com- 
municated. Perhaps it may be affirmed _, that the language 
can never be good, where the thought is deficient , or trite : 
and , on the contrary , that correct , forcible , and original 
thoughts will always bring with them congenial language. 
The language springs up with the thought ; and none , 
but that which is thus simultaneous , is excellent, or pure. 

All must admit the existence of that moral sense im- 
planted in mankind , which in different individuals so in- 
calculably varies in degree. Thissense must be preeminently 
acute and predominant in a great poet. It must colour the 
forms and pursuits of his fancy; and shape them to its own 
direction. 

It may perhaps be objected , that many men of indubi- 
table genius, have led immoral and vicious lives ; and have 
been distinguished for their defect of principles. But these 
exceptions are scarcely ever found in genius of the higher 
class; and when found, are attended by some circumstances 
of peculiarity , which may account for their deviation from 
the general rule. 



Nothing is more curious than to trace the first appearances 
of genius , as displayed in childhood , in association with 
moral quahties. 



62 THE ATfTI-CRITIC 

Original and powerful thought often in its first operations 
puts on the appearance of stupidity or folly. 

He , who is principally intent upon his own ideas , does 
not often apprehend the ideas of others with the same 
clearness of perception , as if they were free from the in- 
tervention of what his own mind supplies. It often happens 
therefore , that unoriginal writers are less involved ^ more 
digested , and more copious , at an early age. 

The sensibility , without which no one can be a real poet , 
often becomes in the first opening of youth highly morbid. 
To foster that imagination , in which he deals , he encou- 
rages a warmth of temperament , which is very dangerous, 
when uncontrouled. 

Authors , who have no heart , may , by the aid of memory, 
at once write things which are apparently brilliant , and 
be men of the world. But to frequent the world , and to 
be endowed with an high fancy , is , at this age , scarcely 
compatible. 

Retirement , and even the deepest solitude , is therefore 
sought , that a field may be found for the due expanse of 
the creations of the mind. And the devotee often becomes 
absent , neglectful of himself, eccentric , and of a childish 
simplicity and ignorance in the actual affairs of life. 

If the circumstances of his lot necessitate the trammels 
of a profession , this devotedness is most unfortunate : it 
disqualifies him from bending his attention to what is re- 
quisite ; while the strength of imagery , which constitutes 
his mental excellence , is a light inapplicable to the hard 
practical forms of things , with which the common business 
of mankind is carried on. 

Perhaps at a later period of life , when the passions calm , 
and the ideas become more settled , and more under the 
dominion of the judgement, this conflict lessens, if it does 
not cease ; and a familiarity and conformity with the habits 



PROPER OBJECTS OF AUTHORS. 63 

of man in society may be united with the indulgence of a 
rich and pure imagination. 

In early youth those images are almost exclusively che- 
rished , of which the pleasure depends solely on the emo- 
tion they cause : as years advance , others of a more com.plex 
nature are encouraged; and the fruits of reason and moral 
experience are ingredients which aid in forming the interest 
of the pictures presented. In these maturer days a deep 
knowlege of the moving springs of life, and an acute sagacity 
in discriminating the human character, are snpperadded to 
the more brilliant stores, which adorned the poet's youthful 
mind. 

But there is a chaos , before these contending qualities of 
the mind arrange themselves into their relative places , under 
which, in many cases, the patient sinks. He experiences the 
demands of opposites duties ; he finds his powers unequal 
to his ambitions ; and he despairs. 

If the maxim of « possunt, quia posse videtur^ » be true; 
the reverse is also true. With the loss of self-confidence 
comes inability. We then fall into humble pursuits ; and 
strive to amuse ourselves without effort, when effort can 
hope no reward. 

He , who cannot resist detraction , is utterly unfitted to 
struggle in society. Mankind are ready and ingenious in 
degrading; but slow and unwilling to praise. The superio- 
rity of others is never acknowledged , till after repeated 
attempts to cast them down. 

It is said , that criticism can only support itself, when it 
is just. This assertion has not even the semblance of truth : 
it assumes that readers are capable of detecting bad taste, 
bad reasoning, bold falsehoods, and unprincipled wit; and 
that they resist the gratification of malignity , jealousy, and 
envy. 

The fire of high hopes is difficult to be supported amid 



64 THE AIN^TI-CRITIC 

the damp of the impending clouds of life , even when en- 
couraged by others : when it has to endure the additional 
chills of bitterness and hatred , how great must be its 
strength to surmount extinction! The languor, that follows 
energetic labours, the waste that accompanies a .violent exci- 
tement of the animal spirits , are alone obstacles which 
few have the permanent vigour to contend with. 

But I know not why he, who is conscious of his own 
intellectual gifts , should fret himself about the censures of 
the malignant , the wanton , or the foolish. They cannot 
divest him of the endowments , which nature has bestowed j 
nor finally suppress the notice , which truth and justice 
vnll at last confer. Time examines , and sifts , and weighs 
with precision} and will award the price that shall be due. 



XIIL 
ROUSSEAU. 



Few , if any , characters afford more subjects for reflec- 
tion, than that of Joh?* James Rousseau. Wo one has drawn 
forth more bitter censures ; and scarcely another has given 
occasion to so many warm and eloquent panagyrics. 

The most enlightened candour is often staggered in the 
attempt to reconcile the virtues and the faults , the strength 
and the weakness, of this most extraordinaiy man. 

Many undeserving persons have obtained great celebrity, 
which has lasted for a short time. Bat a celebrity , which 
endures, and even increases, for half a century after death, 
can scarcely be factitious. It becomes therefore a point of 



HOUSSEAU* 65 

iiigli curiosity, and profound instruction, to endeavour to 
discriminate the qualities, on which such a celebrity is 
founded. 

Mere rarity of endowments will little avail in securing a 
general interest. They must be such, as « come home to 
every one's bosom ». 

I survey with admiration , without being able to analyse , 
the power, which can light a fire in the hearts of the dull, 
and the cold. But it seems to be the eloquence of Rousseau, 
the native and unprompted fervor of his sentiments and 
images , which gives him the superiority , that eclipses all 
his competitors. His principles may be sometimes mistaken j 
his reasonings may be sophistical and dangerous : it is his 
unexampled sensibility, which melts and enchants the reader. 
For this there is no substitute in the happiest skill ; the 
deepest learning ; and the most vigorous and exalted un- 
derstanding. 

It is clear then, that Piousseau was the slave of his sen- 
sations : his reason could never master them : and hence 
arose the apparent contradictions of his life. 



XIY. . 
FAME FIIN'ALLY JUST. 

it is a bad symptom of the taste of the' public , as it 
is of Individuals , when extravagance is mistaken for genius. 
It is only upon truth and propriety , that we can long 
repose with delight. What touches us in the moment of 
calm reflection, soberness,, and sorrow; v/hat convinces ns 



66 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

as the dictate of cool and impartial wisdom , is alone the 
standard ore ; the plant of perennial verdure. 

Though « slow rises worth », by trusting to the simplicity 
©f native genius , it will gradually ascend to its height , and 
keep on « the even tenor » of its course. 



Mad. de Stael, in h^r Dix annees d'Exil , p. 17, says: 

« Les critiques dont les ouvrages sont I'objet , peuvent 
etre tres - aisement supportees quand on a quelque eleva- 
tion d'ame , et quand on aime les grandes pensees pour 
elles-memes , encore plus que pour le succes qu'elles peu- 
vent procurer. D'ailleurs , le public , au bout d'un certain 
temps, me paroit presque toujours tres - equitable ; il faut 
que I'amour-propre s'accoutume a faire credit a la louange; 
car avec le temps on obtient ce qu'on merite. Enfin quand 
meme on auroit long temps a souffrir de I'injustice , je ne 
concois pas de meilleur contre elle que la meditation de 
philosophic et I'emotion de I'eloquence. Ces facultes mettent 
a nos ordres tout un monde des verites et de sentiment 
dans lequel on respire toujours a I'aise ». — 



After a life spent in deep attention to Intellectual Bio- 
graphy , I am persuaded that the mental character is not 
so much dependent on external and -accidental circumstances, 
as I , in common with the generality of mankind formerly 
supposed* 

It is the union of the qualities of the fancy , the heart , 
and the understanding in their due proportions , that cons- 
titutes the literary genius , of which the fruits are lasting. 

Literary excellence is the same in all ages and all countries. 
It is the search after novelty , that misleads the taste , and 
pursues objects which, when attained, soon satiate or fade. 



SENTIMENTS APPROPRIATED. 67 

Providence has been pleased to dispense her gifts in a 
mysterious manner. Nature will follow its bent : and when 
the mind is fertile, it will throw forth flowers, in spite of 
blights and intermingling weeds. 



XV. 

SYMPATHY IN THE SENTIMENTS AND 
CONDITIONS OF LIFE. 

Extract from a Letter y 24 May 1821. 

« While I look, upon the various habits of opinion , 
which various occupations universally generate , I am too 
apt to be disturbed in the unity and equable tenor of my 
own sentiments , so necessary to that self - complacence , 
without which there can be neither dignity nor enjoyment. 

An anxious mind frets itself that it can find little sympathy 
with the opinions , and actuating motives of mankind. It must 
go its own way ; and it ought to do so , without vexing 
itself at this discordance ! The diversified tasks of human 
Beings could never be performed , if all had the same tastes, 
and the same modes of estimating things ! One is apt to 
forget , that contentment with one's lot is necessary to each 
man's fair passage through life : and how can this be effected 
but by a variety of judgement applied to motives and ends ? 

What appear shadows to one , are substances to another ! 
What seem empty vapours to this person , are almost of 
the essence of existence to his opposite ! 

« A man » it may be said , « must not be flattered in his 



6B THE ANTI-CRITIC 

follies and delusions ! » ■ — True : — but then comes the 
quesrion , « what is folly? w and « what is delusion? » The 
money-getter thinks honour a delusion ! The special-pleader 
thinks an eloquent persuasive speech a delusion ! 

I would not willingly have that train of ideas torn from 
me, which has been a shield and a mantle in my mis- 
fortunes ! 



XVI. 

PRAISE OF SCOTT'S NOVELS ; — AND OF 
LOVE OF READING, 

Extract from a Letter, 6 Oct. 1821. 

« I think that Sir Walter Scott's Novels have afforded ^ 
useful and laudable exercise to British Intellects. The fancy 
they display is vigorous, manly, copious, and original. But 
there is something too much in them of local and national 
manners, customs, and histories. And I do not think, that 
Jie has drawn the Female Character with sufficient beauty, 
or refinement. 

He brings out his features with so much force ; and he 
groups his figures so happily ; and he contrasts the grand 
descriptions and thrilling sentiments of the poet so striking- 
ly with his Comic personages , and his lively dialogues of 
wit and humour , that he electrifies even the dull and sensual 
tastes of the multitude. 

« Believing , as I do , that the amusement of reading is, 
§mong the greatest consolations of life ) that it is the nurse 



LAKE OF GENEVA. 69 

of Virtue ; that it is the upholder of Adversity ; that it is 
the prop of Independence ; that it is the support of a just 
Pride; that it is the strengthener of elevated opinions; that 
it is the shield aguinst the tyranny of all the Petty Passions ; 
that it is the repeller of the Fool's scoff, and the Knave's 
poison ; I consider the man, who has produced the effects, 
vs^hich Scott has done , to be a great national benefactor ; 
and a benefactor , whose good is not transient , but of 
all times ». — 



XVII. 
LAKE OF GENEVA. 

Another extract from the Same Letter, 

« \ believe that our intellectual existence is quite as much 
intended here , as our corporeal ! I look across the Lake , 
whose blue waves , now agitated by the wind , are breaking 
into a thousand fragments of sparkling foam , — to the 
Alps half - enveloped in clouds : — I see at their feet , 
running hitherward to the edge of the water , the green 
undulations of Savoy , clad with villas , and hamlets , and 
cottages , and towers , and steeples ! — Is not the multi- 
tude of mental images , which I associate with this variety 
of glittering or misty objects , an existence as certain, 
according to its own nature, as these material objects, to 
T^hich it is joined? » 



70 THE ANTI-CRITIC 



XVIII. ^ 
BEATTIE'S MINSTREL. 

The fault of tHs beautiful fragment of a poem , ( for it 
is an absolute fragment ), is the barrenness of the design, 
or story. It wants Incident , where Incident was so neces- 
sary ; and might have been so easily invented. 

The love of solitude , the delight in abstract pleasures , are 
proper accompaniments of the genius which was intended 
to be delineated : but occasional mixture with society, and 
occasional involvement with its passions and its interests , 
would have afforded both those sympathies and those con- 
trasts , that exhibit the primary attractions of human ima- 
gination. 

Man is not intended to be always solitary. He must not 
continually immerge himself in the coarse deadening tur- 
moils of daily life : but he must sometimes become a party 
in human affairs ; and feel the force and the sorrows of 
human affections. 

He must look for the materials of his contemplations in 
Man as he is exalted by sentiment , by intellect , and by 
morals : as he associates himself with the beauty, or the 
grandeur of the scenery of nature ; and adds a world of 
spiritual existences to what is perceptible by the Senses. 

Frail and fallen as Humanity is , it is still Humanity which 
gives the main interest to the fair imagery of this glorious 
Globe. It is Humanity , such as the sublime poet beholds 
it in its choicest examples , which calls up our highest ener- 
gies and noblest sympathies. 



beattie's minstrel. 71 

If the Poet has a right to create genius nurtured in the 
cottage simplicity of entire solitude, and instructed only by 
the cold world rejecting counsels of an Hermit , he has 
also a right to throw him amr.ng the grander iBovemen'-S 
of Mankind; yet separated from their blights, their degra- 
dations , and their deformities. 

Selection , as well as exaltation , is the Poet's business. 
He is entitled to contemplate Man in his belter moments , 
undebased by the meannesses of mortal condemnation. Mau 
was decreed to build up his state in society by toil and 
cultivation ; by the long exercise of his mental faculties ; 
by the enduring virtue of the self - denying regulations of 
the impulses of his heart ; by the elevation of his views , 
and the refinement of his habits. It is then among the human 
Beings , whom the best refinements of society have lifted 
into an higher order of existence , that we must look for 
the occasions that display the most magnificent movements 
of the Soul. 

It was in courts , and camps , and baronial halls , that 
the young Minstrel ought , as an infant Troubadour , to 
have learned his lessons. There an aged Mentor, but not 
an Hermit , unless the Hermit had quitted his cell to accom- 
pany his wanderings , might have given him advice , which 
would teach him how to appreciate the scenes before him , 
and at the same time would give a living interest to what 
he taught : while the cold abstract axioms of moral phi- 
losophy thrown into verse rather cast a dulness on Beattie's 
Second Canto , that all his art , and all his genius , cannot 
surmount. 

It is inconceivable how Beattie , whom the very title he 
chose for his poem would naturally have led to this rich 
train of incidents and scenery , could prefer so barren and 
difficult a plan , as he has elected. Perhaps it is to be 
attributed to the philosophical habits, to which the acci- 



72 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

dents of his life , rather than his inclinations , addicted him. 
He had reasoned himself into a horror of the crimes of 
courts, and the immoralities of society, till he persuaded 
himself that a poet ought to be an abstract Being. 

But whence arise all the grand , the affecting , and the 
beautiful passages of Shakespeare ? — From the complicated 
passions and complicated duties , which the relations of so- 
ciety have imposed on the character represented ! 

He , who retires to muse, without having first collected 
materials to muse upon , commences at the wrong end. 
Books teach but little of life , unless we can correct them , 
and bring our apprehension of them to the test, by expe- 
rience. It is not the business of the poet to represent theJ 
mere scenery of nature unanimated by its alliance with the 
Intellectual Beings , whom Providence has placed to be the 
lords of it. 

Whoever deeply studies the effects of scenery on Man , 
finds that it soon loses its force, unless the varying affec- 
tions of the human heart give variety and fresh impulses 
to its hues and shapes. When it becomes associated with 
some particular impression of the soul , caused by some 
one of the innumerable striking incidents of « many- coloured 
life » , the diversity of its colours and interests is endless. 
How then could Edwin learn , what a young Minstrel 
ought most to learn , by the training which Beattie gives 
him ? How could he conceive those conflicts of Passion , 
which are not to be imagined in the unbroken solitude of 
woods and streams and valiies and hills; but must be felt, 
or observed, in the intercourses of humanity ? 

There is no power of the mind half so admirable , or 
half so mysterious , as the Imagination ! "We often know 
not whence its images come ; nor why they visit us ! But 
they will not take all human shapes without some previous 
acquaintance with humanity. The stimulants of society de~ 



3Bea.ttie's minstrel* 73 

Yelop what human genius unaided by observation could 
never penetrate. 

Of all the parts of history , which would have furnished 
the most interesting and instrucUve matter, if the written 
language had been sufllcienlly perfect to have handed it 
down with frankness and judgement , the account of The 
Troubadours would have stood foremost. I cannot believe 
that those ages were as barbarous , as they are represented 
to have been. Every where on the Continent , e.^,peclaliy in 
Italy, we see the ruins of magnificent ancient Castles , where 
now reside none but a most miserable and half - barbarous 
peasantry. These Castles must have diffused in tlieir neigh- 
bourhoods comparative civility , employment , and wealth. 
The relics , which have come down to us of the compo- 
sitions of the Troubadours frequently afford instances of 
a refinement of sentiment and turn of expression , which 
testify an advance of intellectual cultivation , and a polish 
of manners , such as modern opinions regarding them seem 
to be very little aware of. 

Seattle would therefore have incurred no impropriety in 
placing his Minstrel in such an age, and amid such manners. 
Gray complains that this poem wants action ; and says that 
the hero of it ought to be made to produce by the effects of his 
Art some great National Good. It would have required but 
a moderate degree of Invention and Ingenuity , to have 
done this by the Harp of a Troubadour in an hundred ways. 
He might turn aside the heart of some ferocious Warrior 
from a cruel design : he might contribute to inflame that 
Love , of which the influence might be a blessing to a People ' 
he might stir up the soul of some great Captain to avenge 
the wrongs of his country ; and to defend its liberties : 

« And if aught else great bards beside 
In sage and solemn tunes have sung , 

to 



74 THE ANTI-CRITie 

Of turneys , and of trophies hung , 
Of forests, and enchantments drear, 
Where more is meant than meets the ear ». 

For here it is, that 

- — « Throngs of knights and barons bold , 
In weeds of peace , high triumphs hold, 
With store of ladies , whose bright eyes 
Rain influence , and judge the prize 
Of wit or arms , while both contend 
To win her grace , whom all commend «. 

To own the truth, it seems as if Bealtie , though an 
enlightened and excellent man , had a little gh'en way to 
the infection of the cant of the crimes of courts and kings ; 
and therefore that the purity of his hero's operations ought 
to keep aloof from any mixture with the manners and events 
of such society. 

However philosophical and just this may appear to some, 
a wider , more liberal , and more profound view of human 
nature , will teach a very different lesson. The dignity of 
rank , the splendor of riches , the dazzle of magnificence , 
the luxury of refinement , are neither vanities , nor usur- 
pations Tipon others , when they are the rewards of virtue , 
and the results of abundant capital duly distributed ; and 
all of them disposed and expended with wisdom , genius 
taste , and moderation. Their proper existence stands upon 
the eternal laws of our nature : it is their abuse only , 
which is reprehensible. 

Beattie might therefore have sent Edwin to strike his 
Harp to Conquerors and Beauties without exposing to a 
taint the purity or the sublimity of his poetical occupations. 
The mind richly- stored , copious in the materials of fancy, 
and vigorously exercised in the faculties of a creative 



beattie's minstrel. 75 

imagination , may retire to the depth of woods , that it 
may have leisure and quiet to digest and new -build what 
it has gathered. But his formations can be of little worth , 
whose experience has not been gained in the schools of life , 
and whose creations are not deeply tinctured with the diver- 
sified colours of humanity. 

The morbidness of Genius may fly with disgust from social 
man , when fallen from the high purposes of his station : 
but he flies from man as he is , to contemplate by the com- 
parison man as he might be. He, who has always been 

— « Out of humanity's reach ; » 

who has never known the delight of the innumerable moral 
ties , which link us to material existence , wants the foundation 
of all that makes intellectual invention interesting. The cloud- 
capt mountain , the smiling valley , the umbrageous grove , 
the waving wood, and the blue glittering ocean, are nothing , 
but as they are connected with the haunts, and the feelings 
of Man (i). 

The great beauties of Beattie's poem are the clearness, the 
elegance , eloquence , and energy of the language ; the har- 
mony of the versification ; the glow of imagery ; and the 
purity , gentleness , and sweetness of sentiment. These are 
high merits ; but still they are not all the merits which 
the best poetry requires. Beattie wants the magician's wand j 
that power of vivid creation , which transports , bewitches , 
and overcomes the reason like a brilliant dream. Every where 
the hand of the artist is seen; of the philosopher, the critic, 
the experienced author : but more especially, of the Meta- 
physical Lecti r-?r and Controversiaslist , whose manner of 

(i) Gampbellhas given a very beautiful apology for Edwin's « isolated 
and myslic abstraction from mankind)) : but to me it is not salisfactory. 
See Campbell's British Poets, VII. 43. 



76 THE Al?fTI- CRITIC 

instruction and reflection are not at all suited to Edwin's 
situation and cliaracter. 



Since the above was sent to the Press , I have met with 
the following passage in the Number just published of the 
Edinburgh Review , which seems to me to coincide entirely 
with the opinions I have written. 

« The moral improvement to be derived from all narra^ 
live , whether it be historical , or what is called fictitious , 
is in proportion to the degree in which it exercises and 
thereby strengthens the social feelings and moral princi- 
ples of the reader. In both cases it excites emotions similar 
to those inspired by the men and actions which surround 
us in the world. Our habits of moral feeling are formed 
by life ; — and they are strengthened by the pictures of 
life. In the perusal of History or Fiction , as in actual ex- 
perience , we become better by learning to sympathise w'>th 
misfortune , and to feel indignation against baseness. The 
narrative of events which have occurred^ or which probably 
may occur , is thus one of the most important parts of the 
moral education of majihind. It is not however by the 
common-place and trivial moralities , which may be inferred 
from, or illustrated by every narrative, that the historian 
contributes to the morcdily of his reader. These general 
conclusions are already known to every child ; and nothing 
has less effect on the character, or feelings , than the repe^ 
lition of such paltry adages. He can improve his readers 
only by interesting them ; and he can interest them only 
by that animated j^epresentation of men and actions which 
inspires feelings almost as strong as those which are exci- 
ted by present realities. Delight and improvement must 
therefore be produced by the very same means ; and if the 
history of former ages be delightful only when it has the 
picturesque particularity of origivial writers , it must depend 



COWPER NO INVENTOR. 77 

dlso in part on the study of the same writers for the attain- 
ment of its highest purposes (i) ». ■ — 



XIX, 

COWPER NO INVENTOR, 



I have already said something of Cowper. I am drawn 
back to him by the remarks arising out of the character 
^scribed to Seattle's Minstrel. Campbell observes of Cowper , 
that « as an original writer, he left the ambitious and luxu- 
riant subjects of Fiction and Passion , for those of real life 
and simple nature , and for the developement of his own 
earnest feelings , in behalf of moral and religious truth » — 
« He fojms a striking instance of Genius writing the history 
of its own secluded feelings , j^eflections ^ and enjoyments , 
in a shape so interesting as to engage the imagination like 
a work of fiction. He has invented no character in fable , 
nor in the drama ; but he has left a record of his own 
character , which forms not only an object of deep sympa-- 
thy, but a subject for the study of human nature ->■>. 

Admitting this appropriate description of Cowper's poetiy 
to be just : — ( and no one will probably be found to 
controvert it ) ; we must reverse all the acknowleged tests 
of superiority in Genius , if we place him in a very high 
class. His life was innocent , virtuous ; intellectual ; and 
affords an admirable example of sentiment, reflection, and 
occupation , to the numbers of mankind whom their fate 

(i) Edinb. Rev. July 1821. N-o LXX, p- 493, in the Article on 
$ismondVs History of France. 



78 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

throws into rural retirement supported by an humble com- 
petence. The distinction between such a delineation of do- 
mestic life , and a display of the grand scenes of history , or 
the magnificent forms of Imagination, is universally unders- 
tood and undisputed in Painting. No one would put a 
Jansen , a Mireveldt , or even a Teniers , a Breughel , a 
Ruysdale , against a Raffaele , a Corregio , a Guido , or a 
Salvator Rosa. To copy Nature with exactness , even though 
the objects should be both diversified and selected for their 
beauty , is not the great effort of Genius. 

Fancy may be conceded to Cowper ; — fancy easy, clear 
gentle , elegant ; yet seldom vigorous ; — but , ( if imagi-^ 
nation implies invention), few poets have shewn less ima- 
gination. 

There is , however , a passage in his Tasky which always 
strikes me to have been the momentary flash of a fine ima- 
gination If 

« Tis morning ; and the Sun , with ruddy orb 
Ascending, fires th' horizon; while the clouds, 
That crowd away before the dri^dng wind, 
More ardent as the disk emerges more , 
Resemble most some city in a blaze , 
Seen through a leafless wood ». — 

Perhaps it had been happier for Cowper , if he had in- 
dulged his imagination more ! If he had wandered farther 
from Self; and forgot the sad realities which often oppressed 
him , amid the visions of a creative mind ! — 

How striking must this appear , if we compare him with 
Tasso , shut in his dismal vault at Ferrara ! What gleam 
of consolation could Tasso receive but by the light of his 
undimmed and magical imagination ? How the heart of a 
reader sinks even at the distance of more than two cen- 



COWPER NOR INVENTOR. 79 

turies at these words in a Letter of Goselini to Aldus, dated 
Oct. 1 582 : « / have seen poor Tasso in a most miserable 
state , not in intellect , in which he appeared from a long 
conversation with him sound and entire ; but from nakedness 
and hunger , which he suffers in his captivity (i) ». 

Of all the literary anecdotes, which I can recollect, this 
is the most soul -rending. It excites the most unqualified 
indignation J the most 

— « Grim-visaged , comfortless despair ! » 

Yet even here Imagination could supply a balm , and alle- 
viate such unspeakable sufferings ! If ever a deity inhabited 
a mere mortal frame , it must have been the spirit of a 
deity in Tasso , wljich such usage , ( the crime that can never 
be washed out from the House of Ferrara ) , could not ex- 
tinguish ! I have seen (2) and entered that dark , damp , 
narrow , bare-walled , maddening vault ; and never , while 
the memory of any human misery remains with me , shall 
I forget it ! 

Cowper possessed no part of Tasso's magnanimity of soul. 
He had the feebleness , as he had the simplicity , of infancy. 
The great tasks of human affairs are not performed by such 
qualities. The perilous ambition of sublime duties is stimu- 
lated by more daring and inventive genius. But I recollect 
that there are duties for all : 

— « God doth not need 
Either man's work , or his own gifts ; who best 
Bear his mild yoke , they serve him best ; his state 
Is kingly ; thousands at his bidding speed , 

(i) See Res Literarice , II, 142. 

(2) On Thursday April 19, 1821 , in a Journey from Rome t«> 
Venice. 



80 i^HE AlVTI-CRITIC 

And post o'er land and ocean without rest : " 
Tliey also serve , who only stand and wait (i). 



XX. 

ON MORAL AND DOMESTIC POETRY. 



Having in the last articles advocated the more energetic ^ 
more sublime, and more fiery trails of poetry , I am willing 
to admit what has been most ingeniously and most eloquently 
said on the mild , moral , and practical productions of the 
Muse ; on that , which « icomes home to every man's business 
and bosom », 

I extract with pleasure therefore the following extraordi-^ 
narily beautiful passages from the Edinburgh, Review^ March 
1819 , W.*^ LXII , p. 325. 

CRITIQUE ON ROGEHS'S POEBI OF HUMAN LIFE. 



« The Life, which this poem endeavours to set before us, is 
not Life diversified with strange adventures, embodied in ex- 
traordinary character , or agitated with turbulent passions ; 
but the ordinary, practical, and amiable life of social, in- 
telligent , and affectionate men ; such, ia short , as multi- 
tudes may be seen living every day in this country ». — • 

fc The poet looks on Man , and teaches us to look on 
lilm, not merery v ih love but with reverence; and mingling 
a sort of considerate pity for the shortness of Ids busy, 

(1) Killoa's Soiiuet On. his Blindness. 



ON MORAL AND DOMESTIC POETRY. 8 1 

little career, and for the disappointments and weaknesses , 
by which it is beset , with a genuine admiration of the great 
capacities he unfolds , and the high destinies to which he 
seems to be reserved , works out very beautiful and enga- 
ging pictures both of the affections by which life Is endeared , 
the trials to which it is exposed, and peaceful enjoyments 
with which it may often be filled. 

«This, after all, we believe, is the tone of true wisdom 
and true virtue — and that to which all good natures 
draw nearer , as they approach to the close of life , and 
come to act less , and know and meditate more, on the 
varying and crowded scenes of human existence. — > When 
the inordinate hopes of. early youth, which provoke their 
own disappointment , have been sobered down by longer 
experience and more extended views ; when the keen con- 
tentions and eager rivalries , which employed our riper 
age , have expired or been abandoned , — when we have 
seen year after year the objects of our fiercest hostility 
or of our fondest affections , lie down together in the 
hallowed peace of the grave — when ordinary pleasures 
and amusemenis begin to be insipid ; and the gay derision 
which seasoned them to appear fiat and importunate — 
when we reflect how often we have mourned and been, 
comforted — what opposite opinions we have successively- 
maintained and abandoned — to what inconsistent habits 
we have gradually been formed — and how often the ob- 
jects of our pride have proved the sources of our shame; 
we are naturally led to recur to the careless days of our 
childhood; and to retrace the whole of our career and 
that of our cotemporaries , wilh feelings of far greater 
humility and indulgence, than those b whicli it had been 
accompanied : to think all vain bat affection and honour ; 
the simplest and cheapest pleasures the truest and most 
precious ; — and generosity of senaiiient the only mental 



82 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

superiority , which ought either to be wished for , or 
admired ». 



— « No work ever sinks so deep into amiable minds , 
or recurs so often to their remembrance , as those which 
embody simple and solemn and reconciling truths in em- 
phatic and elegant language , — and anticipate, as it were , 
and bring out with effect those salutary lessons which it 
seems to be the great end of our life to inculcate. — The 
pictures of violent passion and terrible emotion ; the brea- 
thing characters , the splendid imagery and bewitching 
fancy of Shakespeare himself are less frequently recalled, 
than those great moral aphorisms in which he has so often 

« Told us the fashion of our own estate ; 
The secrets of our bosoms ». — 

and in spite of all that may be said by grave persons of 
the frivolousness of poetry, and of its admirers, we are 
persuaded that the most memorable and the most generally 
admired of all its productions, are those which are chiefly 
recommended by their practical wisdom , and their coinci- 
dence with those salutary intimations , with which nature 
herself seems to furnish us from the passing scenes of our 
existence ». 



« In this poem we have none of the broad and blazing 
tints of Scott — nor the startling contrasts of Byron — 
nor the anxious and endlessly repeated touches of Southey — 
but something which comes much nearer to the soft and 
tender manner of Campbell , with still more reserve and 
caution perhaps , and more frequent sacrifices of strong 
and popular effect , to an abhorrence of glaring beauties , 
and adisdain of vulgar resources ». 



CRITICAL SEVERITY, 83 



XXI. 

exaggeratio]n:s of critical censure. 

The sam« Number of the Review last cited contains the 
following important confession and apology of the severities 
of that Journal. It is contained in a Critique On Campbell's 
Poets. ( See p. [\^i ). 

« fVe are most willing to achnowlege that the defence of 
Burns against some of the severities of this Journal is subs- 
tantially successful , etc^ 

» On looking hack on what we have said on these sub- 
jects^ we are sensible that we have expressed ourselves with 
too much bitterness , and made the words of our censure 
far more comprehensive than our meaning. A certain tone 
of exaggeration is incident, we fear, to the sort of writing 
in which we are engaged. Reckoning a little too much on 
the dulness of our readers , we are too often led insensibly 
to overstate our sentiments in order to make them understood ; 
and when a little controversial warmth is added to a little 
love of effect y an excess of colouring is apt to steal over 
the canvas , which ultimately offends no eye so much as 
our own ». 



84 THE AlVTI-CRITIC 



XXII. 
BUSY AND INTRIGUING AUTHORS. 



Petrarch has the following passage in his Senilia, Lib. V, 
Epist. III. 

« Sunt homines non magni ingenii , magnas vero memo- 
ri« , magnasque dlligentia? , sed majoris audacige : regnm ac 
potenl'im aulas frequentant, de proprio nudi, vesfiti autem 
carminibus alienis ; dumque qnid ab hoe ant ab illo exqui- 
sitiiis in materno pr^psertim carartpre dictrm si»^ , inerenti 
expressione pronunciant , gratiam sibi nobilium ac pecunias 
quaerunt, el vestes, et munera », 



This passage may be in some degree applied to the cha- 
racter of David Mallet (i), of whom Johnson says, that 
« His works are such , as a writer bustling in the world , 
shewing himself in public, and emerging occasionally, from 
time to time , into notice, might keep alive by his personal 
influence ; but which , conveying little information , and 
giving no ' great pleasure, must soon give way, as the 
succession of things produces new topics of conversation , 
and other modes of amusement ». — 



(?) He died in April, lySS. 



GENIUS OF BURNS. 85 

XXIIL 

GENIUS OF BURNS. 



There is a genuine charm both about the personal cha- 
racter and about the poetry of Burns , which eludes ana- 
lysis. I sometimes fancy it to be sincerity : the result of an 
enthusiasm which was never affected; and of a force which 
was never artificial. But sincerity would be but little, unless 
it should be a sincerity in what is noble , or beautiful , or 
amiable. This was the case with Burns. He was open to 
momentary seductions ; he could feel unkind passions , or 
little ones ; and when they came , he had not the hypo- 
crisy to conceal them , if he had not the due self-controul 
to suppress them. He might therefore raise fear or dislike , 
when men more deserving it , escaped it. 

The same freedom that shewed his ill-humours , made 
him more bold in the display of those which were good ; 
and secured a better reception for them. 

Every thing in the mind of Burns was disposed , or 
arranged, poetically. The imagination of the poet is exer- 
cised In rejection , as well as in addition ; in dismissing all 
but leading circumstances ; and in giving effect to the fea- 
tures of what it represents by new positions. 

Many of this Poet's Songs are written in his own cha- 
racter ; but often under imaginary incidents : when he 
writes in the character of another , he identifies himself 
with it; and represents it only under the influence of an 
imaginative mood. 

It is this habitual presence of Genius that renders the 



86 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

narration of all the little events of his life so attractive. At the 
plough, at the feast, or strolling on the banks of « the winding 
Ayr » , he is still the same magical Being ; the Bard whose 
glowing mind no familiar occupation , no practical employ- 
ment, can clond. 

But of all that the fire of this unqualified , inextinguishable 
genius produced, (perhaps of all the short pieces of imagi- 
nation in the English language ) , — the most brilliant , 
the most electrifying , the most inimitable , is the Tale of 
Tarn o' Shanter (i). 

Tam is returning from the market of Ayr of a dark night. 
His wife had warned him , before he set out , not to be 
late , with the reproach , 

« That frae November till October , 
Ac market-day he was nae sober ». 



« She prophesy'd , that late or soon , 
He would be found deep drown'd in Doon ; 
Or cat ch'd wi' warlocks in the mirk , 
By Alio way's auld haunted kirk ». 



« The night drave on wi' sangs an' clatter : 
And ay the ale was growing better : 
The storm without might rair and rustle ; 
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle «, 



The hour approaches Tam maun ride ; 

That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stane , 

(i) He had originally written this very beautifully in prose in a 
Letter to Grose, the Antic[uary. See Censura Literaria. 



GENIUS OF BURNS. 87 

That dreary hour he mounts his beast-^in ^ 
And sic a night he taks the road in , 
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in. 
The wind blew as twad blawn its last, 
The rattlin show'rs rose on the blast : 
The speedy gleams the darkness swallow'd ; 
Loud , deep , and lang , the thunder bellow'd , 
That night , a child might understand , 
The deii had business on his hand. 



« Before him Doon pours all his floods; 
The doubling storm roars through the woods! 
The lightnings flash from pole to pole; 
Wear and more near the thunders roll ; 
When , glimmering thro' the groaning trees , 
Kisk-Alloway seem'd in a bleeze; 
Thro' ilka bore the beams were glancing , 
And loud resounded mirth and dancing ». — 



Now Maggie, the mare on which he rode j 

— Ventur'd forward on the light; 
And vow ! Tarn saw an unco sight! 
Warlocks and witches in a dance », 



c< There sat auld Nick , in shape o' beast ; 
A towsie tyke , black, grim, and large ^ 
To gie them music was his charge ». — 



Tarn stood , like ane bewitch'd , 



And thought his very een enrich'd ; 



88 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Even Satan glowr'd , and fidg'ed fu fain ^ 
And hotch'd and blew wi might and main 
Till first ae caper , syne anither , 
Tam tint his reason a thegither , 
And roars out « weel done , cutty-sark ! » 
And in an instant all was dark : 
And scarcely had he Maggie rallied , 
When out the hellish legion sallied «. 



a Now do thy speedy utmost , Meg _, 
And win the key-stane of the brig ; 
There at them thou thy tail may toss ; 
A running stream they dare na cross. 
But ere the key-stane she could make , 
The fient a tail she had to shake ! « 



There is no other poem of Burns so characteristic of his 
powers , his habits , and his manners , as this : of his love of 
conviviality ; his bold , daring spirit ; his fondness for the 
sublime features of nature ; his delight in popular supers- 
titions ; his wild and fiery imagination ; the vigour of his 
conceptions ; and the inspired coRdensalion of his language. 

Poetry is here in its true vocation , in embodying those 
visions of the mind , which vanish like the brilliant shapes 
and colours that the clouds often momentarily assume. — 
After all , there are few true pleasures in life j but those 
which result from imagination. Reality almost always ends 
in disappointment. 

Whether it arises from faculties diluted and misled by 
tuition and examjile , or from the sparing degree in which 
Nature bestows the quantity of her endowments, the gene- 
rality of candidates for poetical fame waver between the 



JOSEPH WARTON* 89 

attempt to describe realities , and the attempt to describe 
the visionary associations of things. 

The presence of the true image was too decided before 
the mind of Burns , to leave him in any doubt what choice 
he had to make ; and what task he had to perform. 

Books of criticism , and the rules of writing , may help 
forward mediocrity into the attainment of some technical 
merits; but they often enfeeble or encumber original genius; 
and sometimes destroy it. Fear of touching topics or images, 
not already legitimated by example , produces triteness and 
servility. A timid author is thus driven to describe , not 
what his own experience has impressed strongly upon him ; 
but what he has borrowed faintly from others. 

While therefore the subjects of poetry are inexhaustible, 
authors continue for the most part to traverse the same 
dull round ; or if they quit it , quit it with rashness , and 
pursue the bye-ways of extravagance and delusion , instead 
of the genuine paths of beauty and sublimity which are 
open to them. 



XXIV. 
D' JOSEPH WARTON. 



Of D.^ Joseph Warton (i) I am inclined to speak with 
tespect ; and even with affection , if that word may be 
applied to one whom I never saw. He was a scholar of 
extraordinary tasle and elegance; but I cannot refrain from 

(i) Ob. 1800, aged 78. 



90 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

pronouncing that he has left behind him no proofs of much 
poetical genius. 

I remember that, when I was young, his Ode to Fancy 
was always exhibited to me as a specimen of a genuine 
poelical spirit. On turning to it , after a lapse of years , 
with an unprejudiced eye , I am quite astonished at its 
triteness : it is a mere effort of memory directed by taste; 
the production of one putting forth his familiarity with 
every image and every form of expression of Milton's 
V Allegro and II Penseroso. It not only wants sentiment 
and thought , but it has not a single original image. There 
is indeed a passage , which has often been pointed out as 
fine : but I doubt if this be not the most objectionable 
passage in the Ode, because it wants even taste! 

« Let us with silent footsteps go 
To charnels and the house of woe «. 

« Or to some abbey's mouldering towers, 
Where, to avoid cold wintry showers, 
The naked Beggar shivering lies , 
While \Ahistling tempests round her rise; 
And trembles lest the tottering wall 
Should on her sleeping infant fall ». 

This image appears to me revolting, because it contains no 
redeeming pleasure , to counteract the cold anguish which 
the contemplation of it gives. 

Campbell (i) agrees in this opinion of D.^ Warton's want 
of originality « Collins, » he says, « realised with the hand 
of genius that idea of highly - personified and pictui-esque 
composition , whidi JVarton contemplated with the eye of 
taste ». 

(i) Brit. Poets, VII, 3 19. 



JOSEPH WARTON. 91 

How it happens thai there are so many minds powerful 
in the faculty to repeat , but like Echo , without original 
existence , it would take a long and perhaps a tiresome 
space to discuss. These men make excellent scholars ; — 
perhaps better than those who think for themselves , because 
they receive the ideas of others uninterrupted by their own. 
But the value of their productions is always of a secon- 
dary kind. They supply no novelty either in the fields of 
Imagination , or of Intellect. They want force and freshness; 
and often therefore rather contribute to make a subject 
dull and repulsive , than add to its attraction. 

Cowper says of Pope , that 

« He ( his musical finesse was such, 

So nice his ear , so delicate his touch ) , 

Made poetry a mere mechanic art ; 

And every warbler has his tune by heart (i) », 

This is so in all ages; the object of momentary fashion 
is imitated , till the imitation brings even the original itself 
into contempt. 

It must not be understood that D.'^ Warton had no 
fancy : he had a fancy ; but it was an imitative fancy (i) , 
that moved only at the direction of others. I know not 
that he has shewn any gleams of Imagination, But let it 
be recollected that even Imitative Fancy is a po^iv^r of a 
yery superior class to Memory I 



(i) Tahle-Talk. 

(2) I apply the v/ords Fancy and Imagination in the way which 
modern usage has sanctioned , without enquiring into its etymologic J 
propriety. \ dissuvcie Fancy to be the reflector of images previously exis- 
ting: and Imagination , to be the power of new combinations. 



g2 THE ANTI- CRITIC 



XXV. 

THOMAS WARTON. 



It has been said of Thomas Warton (i) , ( the brother 
of Joseph ), that « all his poems are cast in the mould of 
some gifted predecessor ». This appears to me a most unjust 
censure. It is hypercriticism to deny him such a portion of 
originality and imagination , as constitutes great genius. 

The judgement of Campbell , it must be admitted , tends 
to this more unfavourable character. « His imitation of 
manner, h says the critic, « is not confijied to Milton. His 
style often exhibits a very composite order of poetical ar- 
chitecture ». — « From a large proportion of his works an 
unprejudied reader would pronounce him a florid unaffecting 
descriher , whose images are plentifully scattered , hut without 
selection or relief •>'>, 

This is very severe. I cannot in my most fastidious mo- 
ments perceive that it has even the appearance of truth. 
I exclude from the examination the Laureate Odes, which 
were written as tasks. Campbell himself commends the 
Hamlet ; the Crusade ; the Grave of King Arthur ; and the 
Verses to Sir Joshua Reynolds. This is pretty well , out of 
the few poems the author wrote ; — and he might be 
content to rest his fame on them. It is the part of candour 
to judge of a writer by his best works ; and not by his 
worst. 

(i) Ob. 1790 , aet. 6a, 



THOMAS WARTON. 93 

But the Critic forgets , or overlooks , the Suicide ; the 
First of April ; the Inscription for an Hermitage ; and the 
Sonnets. There may be some affected diction in the Suicide , 
especially at the beginning ; but the whole is the concep- 
tion of a vigorous and poetical mind ; and the language 
in many parts is well -suited to the description and the 
sentiment. The following stanza always delighted me ; 

Full oft , unknowing and unknown , 
He wore his endless noons alone, 

Amid th' autumnal wood : 
Oft was he wont in hasty fit 
Abrupt the social board to quit, 
And gaze with eager glance upon the tumbling flood. 

If it had been said that the author had more fancy than 
passion , and more imagery than sentiment , this remark 
could not have been controverted. He is commonly more 
beautiful than grand : but if he is magnificent , it is the 
magnificence of description ; not of emotion. This only 
proves that his excellence did not embrace all the varie- 
ties of genius. It is not common to be at once descrip- 
tive and sentimental ; although the union increases the 
charm. 

His fancy seems to have been drawn from original 
sources , and not suggested by books , though it may 
have been somewhat coloured by them ; and his combi- 
nations are his own , though perhaps a little influenced in 
their form by artificial models. Campbell speaks of his 
« minute intimacy of imagination with the gorgeous resi- 
dences and imposing spectacles of chivalry «. This is pro- 
perly expressed ; but it proves , not want of originality , 
but a due mixture of the materials , of which , on such a 
subject , poetical creation ought to consist ; a due and cha- 
racteristic mode of arranging them into ideal structures. 



gA THE ANTI-CRITIC 

That Ills fancy and imagination had something of tech- 
nical about them , arose from the subjects to which he 
chose to apply them. The feudal times were full of pecu- 
liarities , the effects of accident , not the results of our 
general nature : it demanded long study y and industry , 
to become familiar with them : and this may have given 
a form of art and toil to all Warton's compositions, which 
superficial and indiscriminate critics mistake for want of 
originality. Genius is generally impetuous ; and disdainful 
of ceremonies and minutiae : but all genius is not of one 
stamp. If the production has the charm of genius , it 
matters not whether the time taken in producing it was 
much or little. 

But then it may be urged that this poet dealt in arti- 
ficial ingredients ; and that when the materials are bad , 
the structure cannot be good. But what is the narrowness 
of principle , which confines the representations of poetry 
to the works of Nature unimproved by Man ? Or that 
allows no merit to the association , even when the mate- 
rials are not interesting and dignified in themselves ? 

The truth is , that much of Warton's poems requires the 
reader to come prepared with far more historical and 
literary information than the generality of those who delight 
in poetry possess ; and they therefore ascribe their . own 
deficiency of cultivation to his supposed want of genius. 

It seems to be a strange assumption , that because an 
author has learning , he cannot copy forms from nature. 
Johnson has imputed this to Milton ; and , in my opinion , 
with glaring injustice. Milton's « images and descriptions of 
the sceJies or operations of nature , » says the great but 
prejudiced Biographer, <j~ do not seem to he always copied 
from oiiginal form , nor to have the freshness , raciness , 
and energy of immediate observation : he saw nature , as 
Dryden expresses it , through the spectacles of books ; and, 



JOSEPH WARTON. 95 

on most occasions calls learning to his aid. This charge has 
also been made against Warton : and made , as I feel con- 
fident , with entire absence of truth. Every thing bears 
witness that he was a minute and attentive observer of 
the scenes of nature which he describes : — • the internal 
evidence of his compositions , the habits of his life , both 
witness it ! 

To put him in a class with Milton is indeed to be very 
indiscriminate. The extent of Milton's invention j the unap- 
proachable sublimity of his subject; the grandeur of his in- 
tellectual conceptions ; and the mild and heavenly pathos 
of his softer sentiments , leave the ingenious and even 
brilliant describer of a few detached scenes of inanimate 
nature , or of a few gorgeous pictures of Gothic manners , at 
a distance not to be counted. But it is too degrading to 
say with Campbell , that Warton is « the heir of Milton's 
phraseology , rather than of his spirit ; » because , on the 
subjects which he treats in common with his predecessor, 
he inherits his spirit as virell as his phraseology. 

I consider the poems of Thomas Warton , though not 
of the first or second class , to have merit of their own , 
for which , if they were lost , there would at present exist 
no substitute in English poetry. 

His History of English poetry is one of the Works which 
I esteem to be among the primary ornaments of our National 
Literature. It unites so many various claims to praise , 
that it is difficult in speaking of it to do it justice. To 
all the arts of composition it joins so much original research 
under the guidance of such exquisite and highly-cultivated 
taste , on a subject of which he not only perfectly unders- 
tood the theory , but was himself a poetical and successful 
artist ; that it at once delights by the charms of genius , 
and gratifies endless curiosity by its inexhaustible mass of 
rich materials. No other work occurs to me, in wliich these 



96 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

opposite qualities are combined in any eminent degree. Here 
they are united in the very highest degree , on one of the 
tnost interesting and instructive of human subjects. 

The Scotch complain that it is not sufficiently philoso-=> 
phical. Are they not apt to introduce philosophy a little 
too much into matters of taste; and to reason where they 
ought to feel ? 

This celebrated History has a character of criticism very 
distinct from the Essay on the genius and Writings of Pope 
by his brother Joseph ; which is cursory, light, lively, full 
of quick taste and simple sensibility, and wanders, with all 
the airiness of a winged Muse, over the whole expanse of 
Polite Letters ancient and modern , while the graver Pro- 
fessor dives into researches more profound, and writes in 
a style more studied and with deeper reflection , what it 
requires an erudition of far more laborious acquirement, 
and of much greater maturity of intellectual attention, to 
relish. 



XXVI. 

RARITY OF GOOD POETS. 



If any one wishes to ascertain by the test of experience 
the rarity of such poetical genius , as has combined all 
the powers and a!l the circumstances , which have produ- 
ced good fruit , he need only turn to any large Collection 
of the best national poetry. 

Of 82 authors , of whom specimens are given in the 
5.*^ and ^S^ volumes of Campbell's British Poets , not more 



RARITY OF GOOD POETS. 97 

than 11 can make any adequate pretensions to the dignified 
name of Poet : and of these last , the pretensions of some 
are but sHght- Among these was Charles Churchill : and 
I confess it is with reluctance that I admit a Satirist among 
Poets , in right of this class of productions. His best eulogy 
has been pronounced by one , of whose own temper and 
disposition the extraordinary mildness adds great force to 
such unexpected praise. 

Cowper, in his Table-Talk has the following lines : 

« Contemporaries all surpass'd , see one ; 
Short his career indeed but ably run ; 
Churchill, himself unconscious of his powers, 
In penury consumed his idle hours ; 
And , like a scattered seed at random sown , 
Was left to spring by vigour of his own. 
Lifted at length, by dignity of thought. 
And dint of genius, to an affluent lot, 
He laid his head in Luxury's soft lap , 
And took , too often , there his easy nap. 
If brighter beams than all he threw not forth , 
*Twas negligence in him , not want of worth. 
Surly, and slovenly, and bold, and coarse, 
Too proud for art, and trusting in mere force ; 
Spendthrift alike of money and of wit , 
Always at speed , and never drawing bit , 
He struck the lyre in such a careless mood, 
And so disdain'd the rules he understood , 
The laurel seem'd to wait on his command : 
He snatch'd it rudely from the Muses' hand ». 

I believe that Cowper was personally acquainted with 
Churchill (i). At least he was famihar with Robert Lloyd , 

(i) Churchill died 1764., a^t. 33. 

i3 



98 THE AHTI-CRITie 

Churchill's mosl intimate friend. When we consider Cowper's 
morbidly timid, and gentle character, this seems very strange. 
There may be genius in the force and distinctness witli 
which characters are conceived and delineated : but if it 
be bitter and revolting , it does not often find sympathy 
among the nobler classes of imagination , who delight in the 
grandeur of virtue , rather than of wickedness. 

But whatever may have been the moral character of 
Churchill, and however ill -directed the virulence of his 
Satires , he possessed a very uncommon vigour of mind ; 
a fervor , that cannot be denied to have been genius. 

It was far ortherwise with many , whose names have 
found their way into these rolls of Helicon. Here we see 
MM. Oldmion , Weekes , Bramston , L. Welsted , Amhurst 
Selden, Colley Gibber, R. Dodsley , E. Ward, B. Booth, 
John Brown ; MM. Whyte , and Dwight , Henry Carey with 
his Sally in our Alley , and G. A. Stevens with his Lecture 
on Heads. 

But there are better names than these , which we could 
almost spare. There are authors , who often approach to 
the very verge of good poetry ; and then grasping out 
their arms , embrace a vapour , and false inspiration. Of this 
character I deem Thomas Peiirose (i) : nor can I hesitate 
to pronounce the same condemnation on John Langhorne (2), 

Yet it is singular that Langhorne has produced a passage 
of singular beauty and force , to v/hich fe-,v in the whole 
body of English Poetry can be compared. 

It is from his Poem of The Country Justice , where the 
benevolent author pleads to the Magistrate for candour and 
mercy towards those, whom pressing want and the powerful 
call of famine lead into crime. 

(1) Ob. 1779 , Oct. 36. 

(2) Ob. J 779, set. 44. 



RARITY OF GOOD POETS. 99 

« For him , who , lost to every hope of life , 
Has long with fortune held unequal strife , 
Known to no human love , no human care , 
The friendless , homeless object of despair : 
For the poor vagrant feel, while he complains, 
Nor from sad freedom send to sadder chains. 
Alike , if folly or misfortune brought 
Those last of woes his evil days have wrought ; 
Relieve with social mercy , and with me , 
Folly's misfortune in the first degree. 
Perhaps on some inhospitable shore 
The houseless wretch a widow'd parent bore ; 
Who then , no more by golden prospects led , 
Of the poor Indian begg'd a leafy bed. 
Cold on Canadian hills , or Minden's plain , 
Perhaps that parent mourn'd her soldier slain; 
Bent o'er her babe , her eye dissolved in dew , 
The big drops mingling with the milk he drew , 
Gave the sad presage of his future years , 
The child of Misery , baptized in tears ! » — 

I cannot account for the momentary inspiration , by which 
one , who is in general an affected , frothy , and sickly writer, 
could produce such lines (i). 



[i] If Campbell is sometimes not very nice as to those , whom 
he admits, he sometimes overlooks with not a little injustice. He has 
given no place to DT Snejd DaAes , a genuine poet and amiable 
man , for whom see JSichosfs Literary Anecdotes , nor to M.»"« Eliza- 
beth Carter \ whose merit cannot he questioned ; nor to the tender 
and elegaiat Charlotte Smithy nor to Anna Seward; Robert Jephson ; 
James Hurdis; Russell; Thomas Warwick; Jenner; Walters: D.'* Delap; 
James Scott; D.'^ Ogilvie; Soaine Jenyns; O. Cambridge; W. B. Stevens; 
R. Hole; etc., etc. 



100 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

XXVII. 
SHEjSTSTONE (i), 



Every thing has two views ; a right and a wrong side ? 
what Johnson says of Shenstone may be appropriate ; -^ 
but it regards always the ill-temper'd side. The Biographer's 
memoir of this poet is a specimen of the degrading manner , 
which he assumed in his latter writings. He was of the 
same College with Shenstone , and scarcely more than four 
years his senior in age : perhaps he had left Oxford, before 
the other's arrival. 

It is true that there is a feeble and unmanly tenuity in 
most of Shenstone's pieces , which fails to make a due im- 
pression on the fancy , or to exercise the understanding. 
« Had his mind been better stored with hnowlege , » says 
Johnson, « whether he could have been great , I know not ; 
he could certainly have been agreeable ». This is one of 
those sentences of caustic and half-colloquial contempt 
towards his cotemporaries , in which the Critic delights to 
deal. But is it not somewhat beyond the line of due seve- 
rity to imply that the author of the Elegy on Jessy, of the 
Pastoral Ballad ; and of the School-mistress , had not even 
reached the point of being « agreeable ? » Yet he praises 
the Ode on Rural Elegance for its meaning and poetical 
spirit , ( a praise which it scarcely deserves ) ; and cites 
two passages from the Ballad , « to which » he says , « if 
any mind denies its sympathy , it has no acquaintance with 

(i) Wm Shenstone died reh, ii. 1762, aged 48. 



SHENSTONE. 101 

love or nature ». And lecommends the School-mistress for a 
sort of merit , which seems to m^e of a very paltry kind. 

I do not think that Campbell is more happy or more just 
in his encomiums than in his censures of this poet. He 
observes that « his genius is not forcible , but it settles in 
mediocrity without meanness » and that n-some of the Stanzas 
of his Ode to Rural Elegance seem to T^ecall to us the country- 
loving spirit of Cowley subdued in wit, but harmonized in ex- 
pression ». Now Campbell well knows the condemnation which 
mediocrity in poetry universally incurs : and as to the simi- 
larity of the Ode to the spirit and sentiments of Cowley, 
few things on the same subject can be more unlike. The 
dissimilarity is a strong illustration of what Johnson with 
his piercing sagacity remarks of Shenstone's taste applied 
to rural ornament : « The pleasure of Shenstone was all in 
his eye; he valued what he valued merely for its loo/,s », 
Almost all the sentiments of the Ode thus compared to 
Cowley are in conformity to this. The sources of Cowley's 
delight in a country-life are much deeper and more varied : 
nor are the sentiments , which are conveyed , merely sub- 
dued in wit ; they are copiously and even effeminately 
dilated in expression ; and so far from being improved in 
harmony , that a varied and vigorous harmony is ( with 
very few exceptions ), the characteristic of that portion of 
Cowley's poetry. 

It is upon the Elegy on Jessy that Shenstone must depend 
for the perpetuity of his fame. It is a model of elegance , 
purity, and harmony of sentiment , imagery, and language. 
But even this wants force : it has a feminine sort of gen- 
tleness. 

He had also a female vanity : he adorned his grounds at 
the Leasowes , that he might have the praise of others 
for what he had done ; — not that he might enjoy them 
himself. 



102 THE ATfTI- CRITIC 

Whether he would have done better In studying men and 
manners than in augmenting the beauties of inanimate Na^ 
ture , may be doubted. It is not a slight good , which he 
performs , who strengthens the allurements to solitude. 



XXVIII. 
GOLDSMITH (i). 



Perhaps there is not a Poet , of whom I entertain so 
decided a difference of opinion from Campbell , as of 
Goldsmith. That this author should be popular among 
common readers , is not surprizing. And if the position 
were true , which Lord Byron has ventured a little too 
hastily , that « the poet Is always ranhed according to his 
execution , and not according to his branch of the art (2) ; 
the Critic would have a better foundation for the praises 
which he thus lavishes , than according to the just prin- 
ciples of classification he can lay claim to. 

In execution , Goldsmith has the merit of propriety of 
thought ; fidelity of description ; and clearness , facility , and 
finish of diction. But these are not the highest charms of 
Poetry. We want something more than propriety of thought, 
and fidelity of description ! We want fire , grandeur , pathos , 
selection , novelty , invention ! 

The Deserted Village is a very languid and sickly per- 
formance. It has a monotonous querulousness , which lowers 

[i] Ob. .774, aet 47. 

[2] Letler on Bowles's Strictures. 



GOLDSMITH- l03 

the spirits , and leaves an impression of insipidity on the 
whole scenery. It is when things are magnified and new- 
shaped by the mists of Imagination , that they possess the 
attractions given by the Poet's wand To paint scenery and 
manners with the exactness of a Dutch Painter , requires 
scarcely any other faculties than a clear perception and a 
lively memory. Goldsmith brings foward many of those 
petty particularities , over which Genius and Taste throw 
a veil. 

It is in vain that the critic pleads that the « quiet en-, 
thusiasm » of his favourite « leads the affections to humble 
things without a vulgar association; » and that « ^e inspires 
us with a fondness to trace the simplest recollections of 
Auburn , till we count the furniture of its ale - house , and 
listen to 

« The varnish'd clock , that click'd behind the door ». 

The vulgar association is so strong , that if all before 
had been beautiful and magical , it would at once have 
dissolved the charm. 

« The chest contrived a double debt to pay^ 
A bed by night , a chest of drawers by day 5 
The pictures placed for ornament and use ; 
The twelve good rules , the royal game of goose ; 
The hearth, except when winter chilFd the day. 
With aspen boughs , and flowers and fennel gay; 
While broken tea-cups , wisely kept for show, 
Ranged o'er the chimney, glisten'd in a row ». 

How can such images as these be admitted into the visions 
of the mind without placing us in the rnidst of all the 
homeliness and chill of pover!;y ? What are the circumstances 
of a peasant's life , which Gray siezes upon ? 



104 THE A]>fTI-CRITIC 

« The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn ; 
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed ; 
The cocli's shrill clarion, and the echoing horn^ 
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed ! 

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn ; 
Nor busy huswife ply her evening care : 
No children run to lisp their sire's return ; 
Nor climb his knees the envied kiss to share «. 

This is not less simple and pure than the language of 
Goldsmith ; yet how exquisitely picturesque and poetical ! 
Gray thus proves that poetical imagery of the most genuine 
spirit is consistent with the simplest and purest language. 
There is not therefore much merit due to him ^ v,ho pur- 
chases a clear diction at the expence of mean ideas ! 

That Goldsmith ",vas a man of very extraordinary talents; 
a man of clear , ready , cultivated and multifarious reflec- 
tion ; a moral philosopher ; a philologer , and an elegant 
historian , ivill be generally admitted ; but that either the 
furniture of his mind, or his taste, was eminently poetical, 
may reasonably be questioned. He was for the most part 
rather an harmonious versifier , than a poet. Indeed he 
scarcely ever rises above this character in his Deserted 
Village. 

His Travellei., which Campbell deems inferior to it , is not 
only far more vigorous and varied in diction and rhythm , 
lhro?3ghout the whole composition, but is infinitely more 
poetical both in imagery and sentiment. It has scarce any 
of the languid draul of the other ; but is often vigorously 
condensed ; and excites admiration by a force of axiomatic 
wisdom w hich displays the brilliant grasp of genius. Such^, 
for instance is his sketch of Italy. 

n Far to the right w here Appenine ascends , 
Eriglit as tlie summer Italy extends ; 



feOLDSMlTHi 105 

itk uplands sloping deck llie mountain's side , 
Woods over ^\oods in gay theatric perid; 
While oft some temple's mould'ring tops between 
With venerable grandeur marks the scene. 

Could Nature's bounty satisfy the breast , 
*rhe sons of Italy were surely blest. 
Whatever fruits iii different climes were found ^ 
That proudly rise , or humbly court the ground j 
Whatever blooms in torrid tracts appear , 
Whose bright succession decks the varied year 5 
Whatever sn eets salute the northern sky 
With vernal lives , that blossom but to die ; 
These here disporting own the kindred soil , 
Nor ask luxuriance from the planter's toil ; 
While sea-born gales their gelid wings expand 
To winnow fragrance round the smiling land. 

But small the bliss that sense alone bestows; 
And sensual bliss is all the nation knows. 
In florid beauty groves and fields appear ; 
Man seems the only growth that dwindles here », 

These lines possess a merit far above mediocrity ; but 
they will not stand a severe criticism : they are more re- 
markable for propriety than for excellence : the epithets are 
general rather than picturesque; and the sentiments, if just, 
have not much either of novelty or of force ; all the sen- 
tences are so balanced; and there is such a tiresome unifor-^ 
mity in the verses , that the magic is destroyed by the pal- 
pable marks of the artist's hand. There is also in the mattef 
too much of cold calculating philosophy ; and too little of 
poetical lire.; 

The description of Switzerland is more vigdrous i 

« My soul , turn from them ; turn we to survey 
Where rougher climes a nobler race display, 

14 



1G6 THE ANTI-GRITIG 

Wtere the bleak Swiss tlieir stormy mansion tread , 
And force a churlish soil for scanty bread ; 
No product here the barren hills afford , 
But man and steel , the soldier and his sword : 
No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array ; 
But winter lingering chills the lap of May ; 
No zephyr fondly sues the mountain's breast ; 
But meteors glare , and stormy glooms invest. 

Yet still , even here , content can spread a charm , 
Redress the clime . and all its rage disarm. 
Though poor the peasant's hut, his feasts though small> 
He sees his little lot the lot of all ; 
Sees no contiguous palace raise its head 
To shame the meanness of his humble shed ; 
No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal 
To make him loath his vegetable meal; 
But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil, 
Each wish contracting , fits him to the soil. 
Cheerful at morn, he wakes from short repose , 
Breathes the keen air , and carols as he goes ; 
With patient angle trolls the finny deep , 
Or drives his vent'rous ploughshare to the steep ; 
Or seeks the den where snow-tracks mark the way,. 
And drags the struggling savage into day. 
At night returning , every labour sped , 
He sits him down the monarch of a shed ; 
Smiles by his cheerful fire , and round surveys 
His children's , looks , that brighten at the blaze ^ 
While his lov'd partner, boastful of her hoard. 
Displays her cleanly platter on the board : 
And haply too some pilgrim , thither led , 
With many a tale repays the nightly bed. 

Thus every good his native wilds impart 
Imprints the patriot passion on his heart ; 



GOLDSMITH. IG? 

And e'en those ills , that round his mansion rise, 
Enhance the bliss his scanty fund supplies. 
Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms , 
And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms j 
And as a child , when scaring sounds molest. 
Clings close and closer to the mother's breast , 
So the loud torrent , and the whirlwind's roar , 
But bind him to his native mountains more ». 



Now mark, what is the magic and the perfection of Gray*s 
strains in the same identical line of Poetry. I am not sure 
that the difference will strike those who are not gifted with 
a very nice taste. But it seems to me that the superiority of 
Gray is both various and most essential. It consists in com- 
pression , force , originality , imagery , diction , profundity 
of thought , ardour and justness of sentiment ; and diversi- 
fied harmony of rhythm. At the same time it is equally pers- 
picuous , polished , and simple. 

The difference which belonged to the moral habits; the 
adventitious circumstances of education and station; and to 
the bodily temperament of these ingenious men , may be 
traced in the tone and colouring of their productions. The 
impressions of one were light , superficial , transitory ; ex- 
cited by , and contented with momentary plausibility ; form- 
ed to catch popular attention; and directed to the means 
of at once supplying an income , and gratifying an inordi- 
nate and almost childish vanity. The impressions of the 
other were the result of long meditations in the closet ; in 
a stale of independence ; in the search of truth only ; re- 
moved from the misleading influences of society ; fastidious 
of vulgar applause ; doubtful if what he wrote would ever 
see the light; possessed of a masterly familiarity with what- 
ever was most perfect in classical models; and intimate 



108 THE ANTI-CRITIG 

with all the rules and all the technicalities by which beau- 
ties might be improved and faults avoided. These advan- 
tages were great; but Gray had also others. If not of an 
high family , he had from a boy been principally familiar 
with men of the higher ranks. 

To many this may seem neitlier any recommendation „ 
nor to give any weight to bis opinions. From long and 
calm reflections on the tendencies of poetical organizations 
and the natural propensities in'serent in t'^e characters of 
mankind , I am firmly persuaded that it has great effect 
in producing rectitude and elevation of sentiment. He , 
■whose subsistence depends on the whim of others , must 
be subjected to the strongest temptation to forego the 
freedom of opinion. That, which is called speculative, visio- 
nary, and empty, by those who are occupied in tiie daily 
provisions of self-interest, is habitual to the generality of 
those , of whose early pupillage the lesons have not been 
disturbed- by the incessant contests of personal preservation 
and personal interest. What is called a liberal education is 
not a name of empty words. It teaches a tenor of senti- 
ment _, of which those condemned by Providence to meaner 
occupations have no conception. 

A college-life is liable to torpor : it wants the purification, 
and the stimulus to activity ,' which the couflicting gusts of 
society produce : but where the native energies of the mind 
are incapable of being laid asleep , there the various oppor- 
tunities given by quiet , exemption from worldly anxieties j 
the furniture of public libraries , and the collision of learned 
conversation , contribute to expand the productions of genius 
into fruit of more maturity and higher flavour , than could 
otherwise have been raised. 

The influences of the world are in constant opposition to 
the higher operations of the mind. All that gratifies the 
ambition, v^hich is not n^erely visionary ^nd spiritual, must 



GOLDSMITH. 109 

be sought by attentions and cares, that withdraw the in- 
tellect from the toils and energies , by which the loftiest 
kind of literary excellence is reached. 

Goldsmith's improvidence , and his restless and dissipated 
habits; the place of his residence; the companions with whom 
he associated , all tended to render that intensity of abstras- 
tion, by which Genius performs its primary wonders, unattai- 
nable. A coarse passage of Johnson may be cited to this 
purpose , which I wish he had not introduced at the place, 
in which it occurs , ( the life of the magical and inspired 
Collins ). « A jnan » says the surly biographer , « doubtful 
» of his dinner f or trembling at a creditor , is not much 
» disposed to abstracted meditation, or remote inquiries y>. 

All therefore that has been done by Goldsmith, might be 
caught upon the surface. He has no curiosa felicitas : nothing 
of which a common mind cannot see both to the bottom , 
and all that is intended. Perhaps it is the very simplicity , 
lightness , and neglect of research , which is his charm : a 
sort of intuitive talent of siezing what lay the very upper- 
most of the top; and throwing off every thing superfluous 
to it. 

Gray, meanwhile , in the safe and fearless privacy of College 
apartments , pondered over the profoundest subjects with 
an undisturbed force of meditation , repeated year after 
year , till the very intensity hazarded a mistake of the native 
character of what he comtemplated. But he had no tempta- 
tions to error from the delusive mists of passion or interest. 
The world had neither promotions nor distinctions to offer 
him. He had in his own possession the means of indepen- 
dence : he sought not the notice of Rank : he had something 
which approached to contempt of popular fame : his main 
satisfaction , exclusive of the pleasure of the immediate em- 
ployment _, probably arose from the proof he afforded to 
himself of his pwn skill. 



110 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

It is probable that Goldsmith had no settled opinions on 
any thing. Facility of perception , and clearness of language , 
were his strength , and his delight. He had a quickness , 
which dazzled, and won instant applause. He always y says 
Johnson , seemed to do best that , which he was doing. 

I may be asked , why this anxious comparison between 
Goldsmith and Gray, poets of so very dissimilar an order? 
I answer , because in so many works of criticism of the 
last thirty years , there has been an attempt to put them , 
at least incidentally , in rivalry ! — ^ To me the dissimilitude 
is so essential and so marked , that they appear perfect 
contrasts ! 

Since Literature has become so extensively a mercenary 
profession , it requires little sagacity to perceive how strong 
an interest authors have to decry the tests of excellence in 
composition required by Gray. Vendibility- then becomes 
the measure of value : and it is the business , not to please 
the enlightned; but the multitude. The Motto to Gray's two 
Pindaric Odes was sedulously rejected in this school. 

The reader shall have an opportunity of judging the 
question between Goldsmith and Gray by a close compa- 
rison. For this purpose Gray's exquisite Fragment shall be 
here introduced at length. 

FRAGMENT ON EDUCATION. 

By Thomas G?'ay. 

« As sickly plants betray a niggard earth. 
Whose barren bosom starves her generous birth , 
Nor genial warmth , nor genial juice retains 
Their roots to feed , and fill their verdant veins ; 
And as in climes, where winter holds his reign , 
The soil , though fertile , will not teem in vain , 
Forbids her germs to swell , her shades to rise , 
Nor trusts her blossoms to the churlish skies : 



GOLDSMITH. Ill 

So draw mankind in vain the vital airs , 

Unform'd , unfriended , by those kindly cares , 

That health and vigour to the soul impart , 

Spread the young thought , and warm the opening heart : 

So fond Instruction on the growing powers 

Of nature idly lavishes her stores , 

If equal justice , with unclouded face , 

Smile not indulgent on the rising race , 

And scatter with a free , though frugal hand , 

Light golden showers of plenty o'er the land : 

But tyranny has fixed her empire there , 

To check their tender hopes with chilling fear , 

And blast the blooming promise of the year. 

This spacious animated scene survey , 

From where the rolling orb , that gives the day , 

His sable sons with nearer course surrounds , 

To either pole , and life's remotest bounds ; 

How rude so-e'er the exterior form we find , 

How-e'er opinion tinge the varied mind, 

Alike to all the kind , impartial heav'n 

The sparks of truth and happiness has giv'n : 

With sense to feel , with memory to retain. 

They follow pleasure , and they fly from pain ; 

Their judgement mends the plan their fancy draws , 

Th' event presages , and explores the cause ; 

The soft returns of gratitude they know, 

By fraud elude , by force repel the foe , 

While mutual wishes , mutual woes endear 

The social smile and sympathetic tear. 

Say, then, through ages by what fate confin'd 

To different climes seem different souls assign'd ? 

Here measured laws and philoso'phic ease 

Fix , and improve the polish'd arts of pieace. 

There industry and gain their virgils keep , 



112 ' THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Command the winds, and lame ih' unwilling deep. 

Here force and hardy deeds of blood prevail ; 

There languid pleasure sighs in every gale. 

Oft o'er the trembling nations from afar 

Has Scythia breath'd the living cloud of war ; 

And , where the deluge burst , with sweepy sway , 

Their arms , their kings, their gods were roll'd away. 

As oft have issued, host impelling host, 

The blue-eyed myriads from the Baltic coast. 

The prostrate south to the destroyer yields 

Her boasted titles , and her golden fields ; 

With grim delight the brood of winter view 

A brighter day , Bnd heavens of azure hue , 

Scent the new fragrance of the breathing rose y 

And quaff the pendent vintage as it grows. 

Proud of the yoke, and pliant to the- rod, 

Why yet does Asia dread a monarch's nod. 

While European freedom still withstands 

Th' encroaching tide , that drowns her lessening lands jf 

And sees far off with an indignant groan 

Her native plains , and empires once her own. 

Can opener skies and suns of fiercer flame 

O'erpower the fire , that animates our frame , 

As lamps , that shed at eve a cheerful ray, 

Fade and expire beneath the eye of day ? 

Need we the influence of the northern star 

To string our nerves and steel our hearts to war "? 

And , where the face of nature laughs around , 

Must sick'ning virtue fly the tainted ground? 

Unmanly throught ! what seasons can control , 

What fancied zone can circumscribe the soul , 

Who , conscious of the source from whence she springs^ 

By reason's light , on resolution's wings , 

Spite of her fraU companion , dauntless goes 



GOLDSMITH. 113 

O'er Lyi3ia*s deserts and tliroiigli Zembla's StioWs ? 
She bids each slumber'ing energy awake , 
Another touch , another temper take , 
Suspends th' inferior laws , that rule our clay 5 
The stubborn elements confess her sway ; 
Their little wants , their low desires , refine , 
And raise the mortal to a height divine. 

Not but the human fabric from the birth 
Imbibes a flavour of its parent earth. 
As various tracts enforce a various toil , 
The manners speak the idiom of the soil. 
Au iron-race the mountain cliffs maintain , 
Foes to the gentler genius of the plain : 
For where unwearied sinews must be found 
With side-long plough to quell the flinty ground j, 
To turn the torrent's swift-descending flood , 
To brave the savage rushing from the wood , 
What wonder , if to patient valour train'd , 
They guard with spirit , what by strengh they gain'd ! 
And while their rocky ramparts round they see; 
The rough abode of want and liberty , 
( As lawless force from confidence will grow ) 
Insult the plenty of the vales below ! 
What wonder, in the sultry climes , that spread^ 
Where Nile redundant o'er his summer bed 
From his broad bosom life and verdure flings , 
And broods o'er Egypt with his watery wings , 
If with advent'rous oar and ready sail. 
The dusky people drive before the gale ; 
Or on frail floats to neighb'ring cities ride. 
That rise and glitter o'er the ambient tide. 



Whoever can read these twenty four last lines without a 

i5 



114 THE ANTI- CRITIC 

delight in whicli all the faculties of the mind are at once 
gratified , is in my opinion , one whose taste and intellect 
are hopeless. Compare Goldsmith's finest passages with any 
part of this Fragment, Now and then, it is true, that he 
rises in his best lines to the common texture of Gray , as 
for instance in the description of the Swiss, when he says 

« He drives his ventrous ploughshare to the deep : 
Or seeks the den where snow- tracks mark the way , 
And drags the struggling savage into day ». 

And again , when he speaks of Holland : 

« Methinks her patient sons before me stand , 
Where the broad Ocean leans against the land , 
And sedulous to stop the coming tide , 
Lift the tall rampire's artificial pride. 
Onward , methinks , and diligently slow , 
The firm connected bulwark seems to grow ; 
Spreads its long arms amid the watery roar ; 
Scoops out an empire , and usurps the shore : 
While the pent ocean rising o'er the pile , 
Sees an ambitious world beneath him smile «. 

But see how Gray , while he never falls helow , more 
frequently rises above this tone ! 

« Say , then , through ages by what fate confined 
To different climes seem different souls assign'd ? 
Here measured laws , and philosophic ease 
Fix , and improve the polish'd arts of peace. 
There Industry and Gain their vigils keep , 
Command the winds , and tame th' unwilling deep. 
Here force a:nd hardy deeds of blood prevail ; 
There languid Pleasure sighs in every gale. 



GOLDSMITH. * 115 

Oft o'er the tremhling Nations from afar 
Has Scythia breathed the living cloud of war ; 
And , where the deluge hurst with sweepy sway , 
Their arms , their kings , their gods were rotl'd away! » 

But Goldsmith often falls into flatnesses , and mean and 
depressing imagery ', such as 

« Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp array'd. 
The paste-board triumph , and the cavalcade ! » 

And part of the description of the life of a Swiss peasant, 
whose : 

« Loved partner, boastful of her hoard. 



Display her cleanly platter on the board ! » 

But it must be admitted that these defects much less 
often occur in the Traveller , than in the Deserted Fdlage, 

It is said , that Johnson added some of the latter para- 
graphs , especially the last , to the Traveller. It seems to 
me, that not only at the close, but a little more backward, 
there are marks of a mind much more original and more 
forcible than Goldsmith's. 

In the address to Freedom , in which it is said that there 
is no good without alloy, is the following nervous and 
striking couplet : 

« Here by the bonds of nature feebly held , 
Minds combat minds , repelling and repell'd ». — 



And again, 



« As nature's ties decay. 



As duty , love , and honour fail to sway , 
Fictitious bonds, the bonds of wealth and law , 



116 THE ATf TI-CRITIC 

Still gather strength , and force unwilling awe. 
Hence all obedience bows to these alone , 
And talent sinks , and merit weeps unknown; 
Till time may come , when strip t of all her charms , 
The land of scholars , and the nurse of arms, 
Where noble stems transmit the patriot flame, 
Where kings have toil'd , and poets wrote for fame , 
One sink of level avarice shall lie. 
And scholars, soldiers, kings, unhonour'd die! » 



Here the writer has proved himself a sagacious and true 
prophet. I fear that the time he predicted has already ar- 
rived. The ties of nature ; of blood ; friendship ; alliance ; 
duty, have almost ceased to operate. The «.Bond and nothing 
hut the bond; » the law, and nothing but the law, is only 
to be relied upon! 



XXVIII. 
BIBLIOMANIA. 



Be la Bihliomanie , 8.° Privately printed , a la 
Haie , 1761. Tripook's Catalogue for 1821 , 
N.^ 1 56. 

« C'est un Spectacle eomique que de voir un Bibliomane 
a qui le Temps et I'Argent sont a charge ^ qui pour amuser 
ton oisivete , pour tacher de se dellvrer de la lassitude de 
?ie yieii f^ire et de ne rien savoir , s'etablit une place et 



BIBLIOMANIE. 



Il7 



jassiste journellement aux ventes de Livres, les examine tous 
sans en connoitre pent - etre aucun , encherit , non comme 
Tin Amateur intelligent , mais comme un homme riclie , .pr^t 
a acheter au poids de I'or des volumes dont il n'a que faire , 
tandis qu'il en soustrait I'acquisition a un Connoisseur qui 
en a besoin. De retour chez lui , cet avide et insatiable 
encherisseur met ses premiers soins a donner une place a 
ces nouveaux livres : il les toucbe peut-etre pour la der- 
niere fois »: P. i8 , 19. Mais apres tout ce qu'on dit de la 
Bibliomanie, c'est le plus sensible et le plus interessant de 
tous les Manies du Jour »v Extracted (as above ) from 7>7/?- 
hook's Catalogue for i^ii. N.^ i56 (i). 



This title , and judiciously- written Extract , give an oppor- 
tunity of saying a few cursory words on Bibliography. It is 
difficult exactly to define where utility ends , and mere whim 
begins, in this science. It cannot be questioned that a great 
number of very learned and very ingenious early Books are 
little known , and of infrequent occurrence : though there 
may be numerous volumes , which have no other value than 
that of their rarity. The rarity may consist in the work 
itself; or in the edition only : in either case the just value 
of that rarity must follow the intrinsic character of the 
matter. There are gord reasons for preferring an editio 
princeps , when the production itself has merit. 

But the Bibliographical Notices , which are compiled for 
the purpose of literature , are formed upon quite different 
principles , and with quite different vie as from those made 
by Booksellers for the purpose of forwarding the sale of 
the articles of their trade. A Book may have very little 
value in commerce, which is exceedingly curious to the scho- 
lar, the critic , the historian , or the antiquary : ~ and ihe 
reverse as often happens. Nor is it from the value of the 

(i) See Saiitander's Catalogue , vol. 4, p, 169. 



118 THE AWTI-CRITIC 

articles taken separately ; but from the recognition , the 
new combination , the juxta-position , that the mind is 
exercised and gratified ; and a recurrence to the test of 
ancient opinions and ancient forms of language promoted and 
facilitated. 

An author , whose name is familiar to us only by slight , 
though frequent , mention , scattered through the volumes 
of general literature, or by references still more brief and 
enigmatical , is brought into prominent observation by the 
pen of a judicious Bibliographer ; and he , who has neither 
time nor opportunity to collect , v\hat lies scattered among 
the masses of so many volumes in so many countries , may 
thus obtain a fund of information , which every highly^ 
cultivated mind will know how to appreciate. 

Volumes beyond enumeration, of great interest, may be 
collected , which bear a low price , because no one has 
set the fashion of enquiring for them. 

Gibbon once intended to have compiled a Catalogue 
Raisonne , of the works used in his great History. How 
inestimably curious and instructive would such a compi- 
lation have been ? 



XXIX. 

QUALITIES OF THE HISTORIAN AND POET 
DIFFERENT. 

^ -^^■^^ — ^ 

The Historian and Biographer have to perform a task 
very different from that of the poet. Their judgement and 
their memory are more called into exercise than their fancyj 



HISTORIAIYS QUALITIES. 119 

and their imagination cannot operate at all , except under 
tlie very strictest controul. It may sometimes under this 
controul , be a lamp to them in penetrating motives , and 
laying open what the veil of time has covered. We there- 
fore sometimes see men , who had not sufficient brilliance 
of genius to excell in Poetry, to which they aspired early 
in life ^ afterwards become eloquent and admirable in 
History. Such was Lord Clarendon , who has recorded in 
the Memoirs of Himself, that his early life ^'i as spent in 
the company of Ben Jonson , Waller , Carew , Cotton , 
Sydney Godolphin , Lord Falkland , etc. 

It was this society , and the cultivation of the studies 
which it fostered, that gave to this great Statesman such 
an insight into the human character. The formal parts of 
History convey as little instruction , as delight. 

Lord Clarendon's merit is the more extrBordinary , because 
his was cotemporary history. 

« Time « say the Edinburgh critics » performs the same 
services to events , which distance does to visible objects. 
It obscures , and gradually annihilates the small; but renders 
those, that are very great^ much more distinct and conceivable. 
If we would know the true forms and bearings of a range 
of Alpine mountains , we must not grovel among the Irre- 
gularities of its surface ; but observe from the distance of 
leagues the directions of its ridges and peaks ; and the 
giant outline , which it traces on the sky (i) «. 

On the contrary , there are great ev Is in the mode of 
composing Jfier-histories for the purposes of mere fame , 
or vendibility. 

« Cest la malice » ( says Bayle ) « cest Vanimosite , ou 
bien I'envie de s'accommoder au gout populaire , et d'en 
tirer du profit , qui engagent a falsifier les relations {^■», 

(i) Ediub. Rev. N.° LX. Sept. 1818, p. 278. 
(2) BayU , art. Du Bellai , I^otQ F. 



120 THE AKTi-^CRlTtCJ 

XXXI. 

SPENSER. 



Spenser has language for all that appears to have pre-^ 
sented itself to his mind. The distinctness , the brilliance , 
the copiousness of his imagery , is amazing. The variety , 
the flow ; the energy ; the swell of his versification , have 
never been rivalled. He wants the deep , and gloomy subli- 
mity of Dante : he wants his concise , and overwhel- 
ming pathos. His imagination was so multitudinous, that 
it sometimes verged on the Fantastic. 



XXXIL 
DEMI-A]S[CIENTS. 



The following observations by Le Clerc in his 
Criticism on /. A, Campaniis , regarding those 
whom he calls « I) emi- Ancients ^ » is worth ex- 
tracting. 

« Les Auteurs Italiens du temps de Jean-Antoine Carw- 
paiio , qui fleurissoit au milieu du quinzieme siecle, un peu 
avant et un peu apres I'invention de ITmprimerie , font a 
present un effet lout particulier sur notre imagination. Nous 



DEMI-ANCIENTS. 121 

ne les regardons , ni comme des Modernes , nl comme des 
Anciens ; mais comme je ne sai quoi , qui tient le milieu. 
Nous nous interessons dans leur histoire , beaucoup plus 
que dans celle de liablles gens qui ont ^^ecu de notre temps ; 
et nous n'avons neanmoins par pour eux le respect , que nous 
avons pour ce qui nous appeilons Y Antlqidte. C'est ce qui 
a fait que quelcun de ma connoissance les a nommez Demi- 
anciens, et peut-etre que dans quelques centaines d'annees, 
I'eloignement les fera confondre avec ceux , qui ont vecu 
long-temps avant eux. Parmi ces Auteurs , a qui Ton com- 
mence a rendre en partie le respect , que Ton a pour 
I'Antiquite , je ne mets que ceux qui ont eu quelque gout 
pour les Ecrits des meilleurs siecles , qu'ils ont taclie d'imi- 
ter; car pour les Scholastiques , leurs obscures reveries, 
habillees d'une latinite tout a fait barbare , ne sont plus 
au gout que de ceux qui leur ressemblent ; ou qui ne sont 
cboquez ni de ce qui blesse le Bon - Sens , ni de ce qui 
blesse les oreilles accoutumees a un meilleur stile. 

La consideration , que Ton a pour les Demi - anciens , 
pour continuer a me servir de ce mot , a fait que Ton a 
recu avec beaucoup de plaisir toutes les nouvelles Editions 
des Auteurs Itaiiens; qui ont vecu depuis le commencement 
du quinzieme siecle , jusqu'au miliea du selzieme , et qui 
ont ecrit avec quelque politesse. Comme les Belles -Lettres 
commencerent a renaitre en Italic, et que Ton a de I'em- 
pressement pour toutes les nouveautez , il y eat alors une 
infinite de gens , qui ecrlvlrent , avec beaucoup d'elegance , 
des Lettres , des Harangues , des Histoires , et des Vers , 
en Latin; entre lesquels fut Campano. On n'etoit pas en- 
core alors assez savant , pour faire des Ouvrages de Criti- 
que et de Philologie; comme ceux que Ton fit depuis, pour 
eclaircir ce qu'il y a de plus obscur dans I'Antiquite. Le 
savoir consistoit principalement a pouvoir ecrire poliment, 
en vers et en prose; plutot qu'a expliquer les lenebres des 

i6 



122 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Anciens. Ces productions etoient comme des fleurs , qui 
naissoient en des campagnes fertiles , que Ton vit ensuite 
pleines de fruits; des quelles eurent ete cultivees , quelque peu 
de tems. Quoi qu'il n'y ait pas tant a apprendre , dans les 
Ecrits de ces premiers de la renaissance des Lettres , on 
les lit neanmoins avec plaisir ; et Ton pourroit dire _, sans 
beaucoup hazarder , qu'il falloit avoir plus d'esprit pour 
les faire , que pour compiler des Ouvrages beaucoup pins 
doctes. Ces pieces , qui ont coule du seul genie des Auteurs i 
amusent Tesprit plus agreablement , que les Recueuils , et 
le delassent des lectures plus serieuses et plus peinibles ». 

Le Clerc , Bibliotheque Choisie , Tom. XIV , pag, 56 , 
57, 58. 



XXXIII. 
HUME. 

An Englishman must feel great interest in the History 
of France for at least eight centuries. It is so blended 
•with that of his own Country , that one (j^nnot be clearly 
understood without the other. It is singular that of neither 
of them has the General History been satisfactorily written. 
We are supposed to have carried away the palm from France 
by the superior literary merits of three Great Historians — 
Hume , Robertson , and Gibbon. 

Whatever may be the clearness of Hume's style , and 
the force of his philosophical genius , his History of 
England has ah^ays appeared to me deficient both in 
nerve, and in necessary details. I would not have wished 



ORIGINAL WRITERS. 123 

him to have either written as an antiquarian; or to have 
descended into prolix particularities : but there are still 
numerous little circumstances , of which the relation iadds 
not merely to the interest , but to the perfect conception 
of the most important events. There seems indeed some 
doubt whether the taste and genius of this great author 
ever allowed him to add minuteness of knowlege to the 
enlarged and general views with which he had studied this 
subject. He wants therefore distinctness of colouring, and 
variety of form in his delineations. 

In Memoirs , and particular Histories , though we have 
a few which are excellent, we cannot enter, on the whole ^ 
into comparison with the French, 



XXXIV. 

ORIGINAL WRITERS. 



How much of what has been already told , it may be 
proper to tell again; what is sufficiently brought to notice, 
if it remains in the language and types of old books ; what 
requires the recognition of modern phraseology , and modern 
judgment ; what requires to be more effectually en forced by 
new words, and new modes of illustration , are questions, 
which it requires great taste, sagacity, talent, and expe- 
rience to answer. 

The number of original thinkers is small ; the number 
of those , who can so far combine their materials anew , 
as to enttile themselves to the praise of belonging even 
to the lowest class of inventors , is still smaller. 



124 THE ANTI- CRITIC 

Of the great mass of what is published by Travellers , the 
materials , the descriptions , and the sentiments , are espe- 
cially barren , and jejune. 

But a man who possesses the acquirements of literature , 
combined with even moderate skill in composition , and 
moderate ingenuity , may write a pleasing and useful book 
on almost any subject with which he is conversant. 



He , who accustoms himself at every opportunity to let 
out the secrets of his heart ; to record the abundant and 
overflowing sentiments which a mind endued with feeling 
and fancy is perpetually employed in giving birth to\, makes 
every subject , which he handles , the vehicle of this sort 
of interest. 

It is impossible but that new situations should give, to 
those who indulge in these habits , copious occupations 
for their favourite employment. 



XXXV. 

TRAVELLERS. 



I am not one of those who think that by residing in the Ca- 
pital of a Foreign Nation a few days , or a few weeks , by 
walking the streets , and seeing the people and their shops , 
and public places , one can penetrate into their characters , 
pxtract their political opinions , and discover the political 
objects , which they are secretly contriving to bring about. 
These things may be |jetter learned by resCfirch and reflec-? 



TRAVELLERS. 425 

tlon at home. But it is the lively excitement which a visit to 
the spot gives to read attentively books which would otherwise 
be neglected ; and to pursue vigorously considerations , which 
would otherwise be abandoned , or carelessly followed ; it 
is this , which gives rise to the knowlege to be obtained 
by such visits. 

As to the information which Tourists and Travellers gene- 
rally affect tG convey, whether in volumes of Narrative, or 
by Letters , it is not only so barren , but so utterly super- 
fluous , were it not barren , that to me no class of Books 
is more disgusting or more contemptible. No country is I 
believe at present unprovided with ample statistical infor- 
mation, drawn with all the advantages of leisure , and local 
information , and of access to official documents and per^- 
sonal experience. In France for instance, what can a Traveller 
tell as the results of his enquiries pretended to be made on 
the spot , regarding the Towns through which he passes , 
which is not already told, with particularity and certainty, 
in the Statistique of that great Nation ! A few pert obser- 
vations regarding the surface of manners and habits , which 
may not strike a native , or . would scarcely be deemed 
worthy of his notice , if they should be remarked by him, 
make no amends for pages of useless dulness. 



XXXVI. 

FAME. 

Every character must finally rest on its positive strength 
in the qualllies on which its pretensions to Fame are put 
forth. No artifice , or adventitious aid will long avail. 



126 THE AIVTI-CRITIC 

Fame is very often obtained surreptitiously : but it cannot 
last. 

What is talent? "What is genius? What is mere learning? 
Surely these are positive possessions, which may be dis- 
tinctly defined ! 

« Esse quam videri » is a maxim , generally , but not 
universally, true. 

There are those , who believe that there is nothing subs^ 
tantial but wealth , which is power I 

They who have wealth , are often willing to pay it away 
for distinction : and they , who have distinction , would often 
willingly exchange it for wealth. 



XXXVII. 

PHILOSOPHERS AND POETS. 



The philosopher considers it to be his business to examine 
every thing by the eye of reason ; to divest every object 
of prejudices and false lights; and to represent things as 
they are ; not as he would wish them to be. 

The poet endeavours to perpetuate the transient colours 
of his fancy; to paint things with the delusive attractions, 
which his desires put upon them ; and to enjoy himself in 
a world such as his mind aspires to , rather than such as 
our fallen natured is placed in. 

Each of these opposite intellectual powers , and opposite 
applications of them, has its advantages. 



BIRTH. 127 



XXXVIII. 
BIRTH. 

There are men of erudition, and authors also, without talent. 
Books without end may be made by those who want talent ; 
and some of them useful. But it is talent , which consecrates 
the importance of an author to the world. 

Books are easily compiled : great information , vast eru- 
dition, are acquirable without great difficulty. Original powers 
of thinking are rare. Brilliance, strength, profundity, wisdom, 
in those powers , are rarer still. 

The public are severe in examining the pretensions to 
notice , which an individual urges in his own favour. If 
they are in any respect not true , or not legitimate grounds 
though true, sneers, ridicule, scorn are the consequences. 

Birth is a pretension , which is seldom admitted. There 
is' a general tendency to be sceptical as to the facts : but 
if admitted , they are not considered solid claims to dis- 
tinction. 

The public probably carries the prejudice the other way, 
a great deal too far * but the matter requires to be ma- 
naged very delicately , and applied with great skill , to 
raise any of that favour , even in the minds of the most 
candid and intelligent, which it is intended to effect. 

Among the impolicies involved in its nature is this : that 
its elevation is an elevation to an equality with all the fools 
and mean wretches, who may enjoy the same descent ; in 
lieu of an equality with the worthy rivals , whom , if this 
test be admitted, it depresses. 



128 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

« A master-mind I » What is a master-mind ? What are 
the marks and proofs of it? Who may be confident of 
possessing it ? It is imagination ; sentiment ; the faculty of 
reasoning; the talent to examine, distinguish, and decide: 
the command of language ! — There must be added to 
this energy , elevation of spirit ; enthusiasm ; love of the 
sublime ; devotion to the past , and the future ; a prefe- 
rence of the immaterial to the material ; and an emancipa- 
tion from vulgar desires and passions! 

Can the frailties of humanity ; can the intermixture of 
some common faults , destroy the character ? Is all the pri- 
vate and selfish prudence of an individual vs^ho gives his 
whole petty mind to his own individual interests , required 
in this character ? — If required , that which is impossible , 
is required ! 

No man is, or ought to be, of any interest in the world 
but by his virtues , his genius or powers of intellect , or his 
knowlege. Rank, properly, and high birth, may perhaps be 
considered to give a claim : but they are nothing , if unil- 
lustrated by one of the others! 



XXXIX. 

THE SAME. 



It would be difficult to define with precision what would 
make the Memoirs of a particular Family interesting to the 
Public. The most probable seem to be facts that ally it 
historically with events of a public nature. 



THE SAME. 129 

There are not a great many Historical Families in Europe, 
It creates a mysterious sort of veneration , when they lose 
their origin in the darkness of Time : when the source, like 
that of the Nile, extends beyond research : when the aera 
cannot be found , at which it had not risen above the 
ground ! 



It has been pretended, that the lustre of a family , if tru§!, 
does not rest upon the written history of it. The facts, it 
is said, will speak for themselves. 

But the facts may be scattered , overlaid with rubbish , 
and can only shine in judicious , and elegant combination. 
They may be like diamonds in the mine , incrusted in dirt. 



XL. 

THE SAME. — HOUSE OF BOURBON. 



Five degrees of distinguished Descent may be pointed out : 
premising , that when speaking of one family opposed to 
another , the male line is to be understood ; and that the 
circumstances to be mentioned , as raising one in the scale 
of eminence above another, are to be considered as adjuncts, 

I. The first degree is mere antiquity. 

II. The second is antiquity combined with possession of 
the same territories. 

III. The third , the addition of high alliances. 

IV. The fourth. Historical celebrity. 

V. All these , combined with the highest rank in point of 
dominion and power, form the top of the scale. 

17 



130 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

According to all these tests it is impossible to hesitate to 
what sovereign House of Europe to give the preeminence. 

In all these qualities the House of Bourbon is so supe- 
rior as to leave every other House at an interminable dis- 
tance. It is probable that the Houses of Brunswicr , Loraine, 
and Savoy are quite as ancient : but they want the same 
splendor in most , if not all , of the adjuncts. Baden is also 
classed with these in point of antiquity , by Koch , who 
asserts that none of the other Sovereign Houses of Europe 
can go beyond the 12*1^ century. He means of course to 
confine this assertion to the possession of their present 
sovereignty. For otherwise the House of Hesse ( a branch 
of the Dukes of Brabant), and perhaps others, can go ages 
further back. 



XLI. 
THE SAME. 



To spring from those , who have commanded in the world, 
not merely by their rank and territory, but by their ih- 
tellectual superiority, is a subject of fair gratification. 

Even the general reader is prepared to recieve with a lively 
interest whatever is connected with history : and especially 
with those parts of history , which are striking or instruc- 
tive in themselves. The worthies of a single Nation which 
has filled an important part in the world , excite a strong 
and just attention in our minds. But how much more those 
of all the principal Nations from whose alliances, or conflicts, 
with each other, the whole picture is formed ! Groups drawn 



MEMOIRS. 131 

from such an extended surface throw a muhiplied light on 
each other. France, England, Flanders, Spain, Italy, and 
Germany, all afford materials, with which all the intelligent 
parts of Europe are linked by a thousand ties. 



XLII. 
MEMOIRS. 



It is easy to understand why the public take an interest in 
Memoirs, which disclose all the minutiae of a man's life ; and 
lay every thing bare to a prying curiosity. They love to 
gratify a gossipping appetite ; to indulge their thirst for the 
degradation of others ; and to JSnd out that Genius has its 
weaknesses , and its mortifications , like themselves. Just in 
proportion as they are pleased , is the object of their enquiry 
humiliated. 

The very cause of the taste of these anecdote-hunters, is 
that, which should prevent an author from furnishing them 
food of this kind regarding himself. 

I know not why there should be more deceit in the exhi- 
bition of the best and happiest parts of a man^s mental and 
moral character , than In a portrait , which paints him in his 
best looks , and most becoming dress. 

Nemo omnibus horis sapit : 

And no one is an hero to his Valet-de-Chambre. 

It is well for frail humanity to be sometimes good ; and 
sometimes great : to have occasional fits of noble thought, 
or tender and beneficent virtue ! 



132 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

XLIII. 
COPYRIGHT. 

Extract from the Critique on the Copyj^ight Ques- 
tion-'Quarterl J Review, May 1 8 1 9. N.^XLl^ p.iii. 

« It has been stated in evidence , that Copyright in three 
cases out of four is of no value a few years after publi- 
cation ; at the end of fourteen years scarcely in one out 
of fifty, or even out of a hundred. Books of great imme- 
diate popularity have their run , and come to a dead stop. 
The hardship is upon those , who win ther way slowly and 
difficultly , — but keep the field at last. 

And it will not appear wonderful that this should gene- 
rally have been the case with books of the highest merit, 
if we consider what obstacles to the success of a work may 
be opposed by the circumstances and obscurity of the author, 
when he presents himself as a candidate for fame, by the 
humour or the fashion of the times , the taste of the public , 
( more Uhely to he erroneous than right at all times )^ and 
the incompetence or personal malevolence of some unprin- 
cipled Critic ; who may take upon himself to guide the public 
opinion ; and who , if he feels in his own heart that the fame 
of the man whom he hates is invulnerable , endeavours the 
Kuore desperately to wound him in his fortunes. And if the 
copyright ( as by the existing law ) , is to depart from the 
author's family at his death, or at the end of 28 years from 
tho first publication of his work , if he dies before the 
expiration of that term , his representatives in such a case 



COPYRIGHT. 133 

are deprived of the property just when it is beginning to 
prove a valuable inheritance. 

« The decision which Time pronounces upon the reputa- 
tion of authors , and upon the permanent rank which they 
are to hold , is unerring and final. Restore to them that 
perpetuity in the copyright of their works , of which the 
law has deprived them, and the reward of literary labour 
will ultimately be in just proportion to its deserts. If no 
inconvenience to literature arises from the perpetuity which 
has been restored to the Universities , ( and it is not pre- 
tended that any has arisen ) , neither is there any to be 
apprehended from restoring the same common and natural 
right to individuals , who stand more in need of it. 

» However slight the hope may be of obtaining any speedy 
redress for this injustice , there is some satisfaction in thus 
solemnly protesting against it, and believing as we do, that 
if Society continues to advance , no injustice will long be 
permitted to exist after it is clearly understood , we cannot 
but believe that a time must come , when the wrongs of 
Literature will be acknowledged ; and the literary men of 
other generations be delivered from the hardships to which 
their predecessors have been subjected by no act or error 
of their own », — 



XLIV. 
LA FONTAINE. 

Extract from La Vie de La Fontaine — before the 
Stereotype Edition of his Fables. Paris 1799. 

« La gloire pour ceux memes qui en sont le plus dignes, 



134 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

et qui font tout pour robrenir, est une espece de jeu de 
hazard ou ce qu'on appelle la bonheur n'est pas molns 
necessalre que la science et I'aclresse. Tacite observe meme 
qu'il y a dps hommes auxquels il tient lieu de vertus. L'ex- 
perience prouve en effet qu'avec les qualites les plus emi- 
nentes dans quelque genre que ce soit , ou n'est rien sans 
la fortune, ou , si I'on veut , sans ce concours fortuit de 
circonstances et d'evenements imprevus qui devoilent le 
merite et qui le font remarquer. On peut juger par - la 
combien il est rare qu'un homme doue de grands talents, 
mais assez pliilosopbe pour attendre tranquillement que la 
gloire vienne le cMcrcber, jouisse enfin de ce fruit de ses 
travaux : La Fontaine mourut avant de I'avoir recueilli , car 
sa reputation , du moins celle qu'il meritoit , ne s'etendoit 
guere au-dela du cercle etoit de ses amis ». P. LI , LII. 



« A I'egard du peu de succes de ses Fables dans un siecle 
d'ailleurs aussi eclaire que celui de Louis XIV , on en est 
d'abord etonne ; car on ne peut nier qu'elles n'aient trouve 
plus d'admiraleurs parmi nous que parmi ses contemporains, 
qu'elles ne soient plus lues , plus goutees, mieux appreciees, 
plus senties. Mais il me semble que se fait s'explique tres- 
naturellement , et qu'on en peut rendre ces deux raisons. 
La premiere, c'est qu'un bon liyre dans un genre ou per- 
sonne encore ne s'est exerce , une grande decouverte dans 
les sciences ou dans les arts , en un mot , un bomme de 
genie , poete ou philosophe , geometre ou mecanicien , est 
une espece de phenoraene , auquel il importe beaucoup de 
se produire dans certains temps et dans certaines circons- 
tances : s'il se montre avant que les esprits soient prepares, il 
ne fait aucune sensation , et est a peine appercu : c'est un 
rayon de lumiere qui perce I'interieur d'une caverne, I'eclaire 
un moment, et s'eteint. La seconde, etc. ». 



SANNAZARIUS. 135 



XLV. 

FRAGMENT OF AN mSCRIPTION ON 
SANNAZARIUS. 



Written at Naples July 10. 1820. 

On yonder vine-clad liill he fix'd his seat; 

He gazed upon that Bay , where now I gaze; 

He look'd on yonder sea-girt isle (i), that lifts 

Its mountain-head amid the azure waves ; 

He look'd on yonder dim-seen Town (2), whose roofs 

Faint-glittering on the shore , recall the fame 

Of Him , the future Bard (3) , he was not doom'd 

To see burst forth in glory on the world ! 

He look'd on yon gigantic hill (4), v hose top 

And sloping sides vomit out liquid fire ! 

Amid the umbrageous covering; lapse of rills; 

And distant murmur of the hollow wave. 

Lulling his day-dreams , he forgot his cares , 

And gave his spirit to the enrapturing Muse ; 

Forgot the painful pomp of Courts ; its frown , 

When smiles are most deserved ; its faithless smiles , 

When ruin most is plotted ; the mix'd bowl ; 

The secret dagger hid in beds of flowers; 

The toil without reward ! . 



(i) Capri. 

(2) Sorento. 

(3) Tasso. 

(4) Vesuvius. 



156 ITHE ANTI-CRITIC 

This may be a proper place to give some Extracts 
from the Latin Poetry of Sanjvazakius. 



Ad Fillam Mergillinam. 

Rupis o sacrae , pelagique custos ; 

Villa Nympharum domus , et propinquse 
Doridos , regum dectis una quondam , 
Deliciseque; 
Nunc meis tantum requies Camaenis ; 
Urbis invisas quoties querelas, 
Et parum fidos popularis aurse 
Linquimus sestus : 
Tu mihi solos nemorum recessus 
Das , et Kaerentes per opaca laurus 
Saxa ; tu fonles , Aganippidumque 
Antra recudis. 
Nam simul tete repeto ; tuasque 
Sedulus mecum \eneror Napaeas : 
Colle , Mergillina , tuo repente 
Pegasis unda 
Efflult , de qua chorus ipse Plioebi , 

Et chori Phoebus pater, atque princeps, 
Nititur plures mihi jam canenti 
Ducere rivos. 
Ergo tu nobis Helicon, et udae 

Phocidos saltus, hederisque opacum 
Thespise rupis nemus , et canoro 
Vertice Pindus. 
I , puer , blandi comitem laboris 
Affer e prima citharam columna ; 
Affer et flores ; procul omnis a me 
Cura recedat. 



SANNAZARTUS. 137 

i^rincipls nostrl decus, atque laudes 
Fama , per lalas spatiata terras -, 
Evehat J qua Sol oriens^ cadensque 

Frena retorquet : j 

Quaque non notos populos , et urbes 
Damnat aeternis llelice pruinis ; 
Quaque ferventes cumulos arenes 
Disslpat Auster. 
iUe crescentes veneratus annos 
Vatis antiquum referentis ortum 
Stirpis , et clarum genus , et potentuni 
Nomen avorum ; 
Contulit large numerosa dextra 

Dona : et ignavse sliniulos juvents^ 
Addidit , silvas , et arnica Musis 
Otia praebensi 



Deos Nemorum in^^ocat in extruenda Domo. 

Di Nemorum , salvete ; ego vos de rupe propinqua ^ 

De summis patriae moenibus adspicio : 
Adspicio , venerorque : cavae mihi plaudi'e valles 5 

Garrula \icinis perstrepat aura jugis. 
Vos quoque perqiie focos felicia dtcite , cives , 

Verba, per inteclas flore decente vias. 
Victim a solennes eat inspectanda per aras ^ 

Turbaque Palladia frohde re\incta comas* 
Mosque ut ab antiquae repetalur origine Romae^ 

Exterior forda cum bove taarus aret* 
Ac prius infcsio tectum quam chigere salco 

Incipimus , jiistos ture piate Deos. 
iNulla per obductum decurraii! nubila cielum j 

Gandidaque auguitum coociiiat omen a\is« 



138 THE AlVTi-CRITIC. 

Exsurgat paries ,. ventos qui pellat , et imbres; 

Qui multa circum luce serenus eat. 
Adsit dispositis series concinna columnis; 

Quseque ornet medias crebra fenestra fores- 
Ipse biceps primo custos in limine Janus, 

Occurrat Isetis obvius hospitibus. 
Protinus a dextra sacrse , mea turba , Sorores 

Cingant virgineis atria prima choris. 
A laeva niditis stratum Pytliona sagittis 

Miretur posita Cynthius ipse lyra. 
iEdibus in me<iiis parvi sinus amphitheatri 

Visendas regum prsebeat historias. 
Ac primum triplici sese defendat ab hoste 

Fernandus rapido jam metuendus equo. 
Alfonsusque pliaretratas , dira agmina , gentes 

Cogat Hydruntinis cedere litoribus. 
Turn juvenis Rex ipse, et Regum insignibus auctus 

Alpinos agatip linquere castra Duces. 
Postremo Federicus , avito Igetus hanore , 

Dalmaticas grandi classe refringat opes. 
Infestosque Deos , metuendaque jura minatus y 

Indicat Nato bella gerenda suo. 
Hie bene conveniens membris variantibus ordo 

Adspiciat celebres e regione situs. 
Exhedroe , xystique , tablimim, hypocausta dietse y 

Et quae privatis usibus apta velim. 
Atque aliae Occasus , aliae vertantur in Ortus , 

Quseque babeant Boream , quaeque inbibere Notum^ 
Jungantur longis quadrata , obliqua rotundis : 

Et capiat structos plurima cella thoros. 
O studiis placitura meis , o mille per artes 

Otia Pieriis nostra juvanda modis. 
Hie ego tranquillo transmittara tempora cursu; 

Dum veniat fatis mitior bora meis. 



SANNAZARIUS. 139 

Viximus serumnas inter, lacrimosaque Regum 
Funera : nunc patria jam licet urbe frui : 

XJt quod tot curie, tot detraxere laboreSj 
Restituat vali Parthenopea suo. 



Carmen Latine redditum ex poemate Italico Sannazarii, 

Ripam gramineam super 

Fluminis nembre in vago , 

Quod semper virides novis 

Pingunt floribus herbae. 
Ductorem pecoris sacrae 

Vidi Palladis arboris 

Cinctum tempora frondibus 

Jam sub tegmine fagi. 
Qui dum lux nitida extulit 

Se undis caerulei maris , 

Tertio caneret die 

Martis ante Calendas. 
Cujus picti avium cliori 

Responsum numeris dabant 

Voce suavidica simul 

Sub leni arboris umbra, 
Jsque , ad splendida lumina 

Ut se vertit Apollinis 

Pulchri , dulcia fundere 

Coepit carmina avena. 
Alme lanigeri gregis 

Gustos e thalamo exiens 

Aurato irradia tuo 

Claro lumlne coelum, 
Nativisque coloribus 

Due extempore floridum 



140 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Nunc ver omnlgenis sinum 
Mille floiibus ornans. 

Tendas alius, atque iter 

Per coelos agitans equos , 
^V Ut printer solitum soror 
Mergatur mare vasto , 

Quam laetos meditantla 

Chores usque nitenlium 
Sectentur pede candido 
Stellarum agmina cuiicta, 

Nam linquens Saperum domos. 
Pavis?i nivras oves , 
Adme'i ad vaga flumina 
Olim , si meminlsti 

Valles, vosque reconditis 
Rupes valiibus additae,! 
Aspirate , Abies mihi , 
Et cupressus , et Alnus, 

Nee fetus ovium magis 

Infectos metuaiit Lupos j 
Ast orbis redeat prior , 
Et Saturnia regna. 

Et per celsa cacurnina 

Jam fagi pariant rosas 
Albas , serilibus et rubens 
Duris pendeat uva, 

3tillent mellaque roscida. 

Altis quercubus , integris, 
Late fontibus effluat 
Rari copia lactis. 

Ploribus nileat novis 

Tell us atque animalia 
* Pellant duritiem procul 
Ciincta e pectore saeYO., 



SANNAZARIUS. 141 



Assultentque Cupidines 

Hinc mille aligeri , at faces 
IN^unc abdant rapidas simul , 
Ardentesque sagittas. 

Et cantus nemorum Deae 

Candidae moveant choros , 
Et Fauni hircipedes, Dei 
Silvarumque virentum. 

IRideantque nitentla 

Prata , et garrula fontium 
Lymplia , ac diffuglant polo 
Astra nubila toto. 

Ipso hoc purpureo die 
Advenit decor sethere 
Ab alto , ac superum sacra 
E domo inclita -virtus. 

Quare erroribus obrutus 
Cgccis plurima sascula 
IN^unc pudiciliam polo 
Delapsam videt orbis, 
Fagorum hoc ego cortice 

Scribo in sakibus omnibus, 
Ut plantse virides sonent 
Nunc omnes Amaranlam, 

Amara hcec mlhi pectoris 
Elair , mis°r ut graves 
Liictusqiie , et geraitus traho 
Corde tris^is ab Imo. 

His dnm monlibus a\iis 
Errabunt celeres ferae 
Pascenles , geret ardua et 
Frondes Pinus aciitas, 

Currentque impete linipidi 

Fontes murmure blaiidulo, 



142 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Quos ilia exciplat sinu 

Molli semper amore. 
Dum spes , atque dolor premet 

Illos anxius , intima 

Quorum pectora commovet 

Aura dulcis Amoris. 
Nomen , luminaque , et manus , 

Crinisque illius , haereat 

Quae mi sseviter ossibus , 

Noscent omnia ssecla. 
Quam saevam modo , et asperam 

Vitam ducimus efficit 

Hsec , ut mi lepida , et simul 

Dulcis esse videtur. 
Cantilena precabere , 

Si quisquam lepor est tibi , 

Faustus ac nitidus, dies 

XJt sit mi usque serenus. 

Anton. Raius. 



In Morum Candidam. 

Nunc , Erato , virides capiti subnecte corymbosj 

Profer et auratae fila canora lyrse. 
Arboris umbriferae casus referamus acerbos, 

Non erat liaec nostro fabula nota solo. 
Audiat , et molli rantantes protegat umbra 

Ipsa , , 

Olim Bajanis fuerat pulcberrima silvis 

Naias , errantes flgere docta feras. 
Quam liquidus clausis Lucrinus saepe sub antris 

Optavit lateri jimgere posse suo. 
Nee semel illras pliarelram laudavit , et arcuni 

Pastorum incullis fistula carminibus. 



SANNAZARIUS. 143 

*r€istes Cumaeae , testes Linternides undae , 

Sanctaque Gauranse Numina Hamadryades, 
Illam Silvanos , Panalque odisse bicornes , 

Et quoscumque coUt silva , nemusque Deos 
Sed quid fata parant ? Solitis Mornlna redibat 

Montibus : hoc illi nomen, et omen erat : 
Quum subita caelum texit caligine nimbus ; 

Et multa canam grandine fecit humum. 
Ilia hiemem fugiens , diversa per arva cucurrit, 

Tecta caput sertis, grandine tecta caput. 
Vallis erat prope sulfureos male pervia montes , 

Candida quam Grajo nomine signat liumus^ 
Hanc super excisis pendebat cautibus antrum , 

Agricolum hirsutis nota domus gregibus, 
Pugnantes hue forte coegerat impiger hircos 

Semideusque caper, semicaperque Deus. 
Quem procul ut vidit , Nymphae , sic pectore toto 

Insequitur ; tales et jacit ore. sonos : 
Quo properas , ah dura , measque ingrata querelas 

Despicis ?. Aspectus ne fuge , Nympha , meos. 
Mecum capreolos , mecum yenabere damas. 

Parebit jussis hoc pecus omne tuis. 
!Nil est , quod fugias : mihi, crede , recentia semper 

Pocula de niveo fagina lacte madent. 
Semper picta rosis, semper contexta ligustris 

De nostro poteris munera ferre sinu. 
Dixit , at ilia Yolans celeres praevertitur auras , 

Imbre nihil motos impediente gradus. 
Jamque petens tristesque lacus , sterilemque paludem ; 

Consitaque arbustis non minus arva novis, 
Adspicit exesi longe sub faucibus antri 

Obscurum caeco pulvere noctis iter. 
Hue tamquam in latebras , se coniicit , haud minus ille 

Insequitur prsedae tractus amore suae. 



144 fHE AlVTI-CRITIC 

Jamque psitens caelum rursus , Solemque videbat ; 

Liquerat et montem post sua terga cavura : 
Dexlra pontus erat , prseruptaque saxa sinistra : 

Et jam defessam , jamque premebat amans. 
Protinus exclamans , fer opem mihi , Delia , dixit :• 

Oraque supremo diriguere sono. 
Attulit auxilium Nymplise Dea ; seque vocanti 

Prsebuit : ilia cadens sponte recumbit humi ; 
Fitque arbor subito : Morura dixere priores ; 

Et de Morinna nil nisi nomen liabet. 
Pesque in radicem , in frondes ivere capilli ; 

Et quse nunc cortex, cserula vestis erat. 
Brachia sunt rami, sed quae nitidissima poma^ 

Quas male ^itasti , Nympha , fuere nives* 
Flevit Misenus , mutatam flevit Avernus j 

Fontibus et calidis ingemuere Dese. 
Quin etiam flevere suis Sebethrides antris 

Najades, et passis Partlienopea comis. 
Sed tamen ante alios lacrimas in stipite fudit 

Faunus; et baec tristes addit ad inferias i 
Inter sihicolas O non ignota Sorores, 

jSiuuc Morus , duris Candida corticibus : 
Vive diu ; et nostros semper tege fronde capillos j 

Cedat ut ipsa tuis Pinus acuta comis. 
Tu numquam miserse maculabere sanguine Tliisbes i 

Immemor lieu fati ne videare tui. 
Tu , nee fata negant, niveis uberrima pomis, 

His olim stabis frondea limitibus : 
Et circum puerique canent , facilesque puellae % 

Ducentes feslos ad tua sacra choros. 
Hactenus insj^ni cecinit testudine Musa; 
Aoniasque volans leeta revisit aquas,- 



SANNAZARIUS* 145 

Marice Garlonice Grappince. 

Propago formosae arborls 

Formosa Virgo , quae vagos 

Inter orta Cupidines, 

Veris lilia vincis , 
Rosasque molles , et croci 

tulchre rubentis igneum 

riorem , et uvidulas comas 

Halantis hyacinthi : 
Redisti avitos ad lares, 

Felicem ocelluUs tuis 

Redditura Neapolim, 

Caro adnixa marito : , 
Redisti ad optatos chores 

iEqualium , el probos sinus 

Matris , ac bene cognilum 

Fratris dulcis amorem. 
Quis o , quis hunc albo mihi 

Signet diem lapillulo ? 

Quis Sabaea calentibus 

Addat munera flainmis ? 
Vocanda Musarum cohors. 

Hue hue, benigna; et abditam 

Barbiton cape , myrteis 

Fronlem i>«vincta coronis, 
Thalia : quid dignum tuo 

Promis favore? quid bonge 

Voce , vel fridibus student 

Respondere Sororos? 
Sed esse quid Isetum , Deae , 

Hie absque amoribus potest ? 

Non movet Chione suis , 

Non me Lyda papillis. 

X9 



146 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Procul facessant hinc malae , 
Saecli pudor, libidines, 
Mi sat est ^ minuat grave 
Si Garlonia curas ! 

Juventa , cur me tam cito 

Ludendo inepta deseris ? 
Haec erat facies novis 
Non fraudanda libellis. 



XLVI. 
A POETICAL FRAGMENT. 

26 Nov. 1821. 

I know not wlietlier any apology will be admitted for 
introducing a fragment of Poetry. If it were not to appear 
in this way , it would probably never see the light : — a 
loss ( it m y perhaps be said ) , too trifling to be counted J 

It was wrilten at a moment of fervor, when the power 
of finishing it was confidently anticipated. — But the clouds 
of life too frequently recur , to allow a continuation of 
that , which requires a long sunshine. — There are those , 
who pretend that the evils of Human Existence fall alike 
upon all ; or only fall differently , in proportion to want 
of virtue ; or want of prudence ; — a monstrous opinion , 
w^hich all the experience of Mankind ; and all the soundest 
doctrines of Moral Philosophy , disprove ! — If it be so , 
then benevolence, and charity of heart, and unsuspecting 
confidence , are crimes. — From these , Misfortune too 



ALPHO]VSO. 147 

commonly springs ; on these prosperity seldom smiles. We 
cannot long withdraw ourselves from the most painful ■vi- 
gilance against wrong and spoliation , without incurring 
the most frightful consequences of our abstraction. 

The World is a field of warfare , in which the needy 
are incessantly carrying on aggressions against property. It 
is pleasant to slumber and dream in the visionary groves 
of Elysium ; but like the effects of Wine , it is a momen- 
tary delight at the expence of Futurity ! 

A worldly-minded man mny write plausible verses : but 
was a worldly-minded man ever yet a poet ? There are 
different ages of society , in which worldly cunning , and 
intrigue, and fraud succeed differently : in the present, 
they pervade , and prowl , almost without a check ! All the 
barriers which formerly protected generosity , and high- 
mindedness , are thrown down ! Rank , birth , education , 
intellectuality , go for nothing. Allow the vulgar to be fa- 
miliar with you ; and they are your masters ! — not by 
talent , or knowlege ; — but by rudeness : not by polished 
sharpness , or skill ; — but by brute force : they have an 
audacity and rashness, in proportion to their ignorance and 
blindness : their own evil intentions guard them against 
snares ; and their freedom from all scruples in the use of 
means multiplies their weapons of offence ! 

Begin therefore with what animation I may, I am soon 
called off to contend pro arts et focis ! A man , who has the 
credit of addiction to poetry , is selected as the best prey 
for the hungry bands of extortion , who are ravaging the 
world. 

The following Fragment therefore must come out with 
^U its imperfections on its head. 



i4S THE ANTI-CRITIC 

ALPHONSQ 

AFRAGMENT. 

Written March 9, 1821. 

I. 

He slept on beds of flowers : his childish form 
Was such as visits Poets , in a dream 
Of infant angels , when the Fancy , warni 
With glories issuing in a radiant stream 
Of shapes celestial from the fountain pure 
Of all the Muses , views on orient beam 
Those rapturous images, that aye endure 
Above yon star-bright canopy , whose bound 
Genius and Virtue have the wings to' ensure , 
Where thousand lyres are struck th' empyreal throne around , 
And echo all the rolling spheres , in concert with the sound. 

II. 

The winds were sighing on his cherub cheeks ; 
And fann'd the slumbers of his tender frame ; 
The blood , that thrlU'd across in purple streaks , 
Bespoke the' internal thought that went and came : 
And feature , limb , and air , and symmetry , 
Announced some Being , of immortal aim , 
Whose future deeds would seek the kindred sky ; 
To live on earth , as with a magic wand , 
That could with power of force unearthly vie; 
Touch each unholy thing with a mysterious hand , 
And hill, wood, lake and sea, and all that dwell on them , 
command. 

Ill, 

Alphonso was his name : when he from sleep 
Awoke to tread the woodland walks , and run 



ALPHONSO. 



149 



Along the meads , and cross the valHes deep , 
And mount the hills to meet the dawning Sun, 
His spirit lighter than the wind , uprose 
To realms of bliss extatic ; he begun 
The germs of Heaven already to disclose ; 
To fill with airy habitants the scene ; 
And as the face of things before him glows 
With every living hue , blue sea, and landscape green. 
To dance about , on airy clouds , the earth and sky between. 

IV, 

He listens to the Music of the Night ; 

And oft times hears slow-swelling on the gale 

Aerial notes sail by on pinions light ; 

Anon with brisker harmony they hail 

His listening ear ; and dwell upon the sense ; 

And o'er each movement of the soul prevail ; 

Till thro' the trembling frame the bliss intense 

Throws off the mortal dross ; and , as in air , 

Melting each earthly manacle, from thence 

The loosen'd spirit seems a while on high to bear; 

And e'en in very infancy for joys divine prepare. 

V. 

The change of seasons was to him a bliss 
Still varying , ne'er exhausted : the first flower , 
That open'd on the primrose bank, was his : 
The purple violet , when the genial hour 
Drew forth its first perfume , unclosed for him : 
The green leaf swell'd upon the hazle bower j 
The pendant willow-rleaf on river's brim 
Hung on its infant verdure ; and the vest 
Of emerald bright, that, as the shadows dim 



150 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Fled the new-beaming sun , each hill and valley dre&t , 
For him prepared the laughing scene ; for him young Nature 
blest. 

VI. 

When summer's broad effulgence full displayed 

Creation in her prodigality 

Of pomp and garniture , for him array'd 

In all its splendor look'd the golden sky ; 

For him the woods their grateful umbrage cast ; 

For him the rippling current murmur'd by ; 

For him the breath of ripening harvests past ; 

For him the blaze of vegetation's hues 

Innumerous glitter'd in profusion vast ; 
For him yon Ocean's waves their mirror wide diffuse ; 
For him o'er all the face of earth Heaven life and riches 
strews. 



XL VII. 

POEMS OF M. A. FLAMINIUS. 

De Laudihus Mantuce. 

Felix Mantua , civitatum ocelle , 
Quam Mars Palladi certat . usque et usque 
Claram reddere gentibus , probisque 
Ornare ingeniis virorum , et armis ; 
Te frugum facilis, potensque rerum 
Tellus , te celerem facit virente 



M. ANTONIUS FLAMINIUS. 151 

Qui rlpa , calamisque flexuosas 
Leni flumine Mincius susurrat , 
Et qui te lacus intrat , advenisque 
Dites mercibus invehit carinas. 
Quid palatia culta , quid Deorum 
Templa, quid memorem vias , et urbis 
Moles nubibus arduis propinquas ? 
Pax secura loco , quiesque nullis 
Turbata exiliis, frequensque rerum 
Semper copia , et artiura bonarum. 
Felix Mantua , centiesque felix , 
Tantis Mantua dotibus beata; 
Sed felix magis , et magis beata, 
Quod his temporibus, rudique saeclo 
Magnum Castaliona protulisti. 



Ad Stephanum Saulium* 

Ne tu beatum dixeris, optime 

Sauli , superbo limine civium 
Qui prodit hinc et hinc caterva 
Nobilium comitante cinctus ; 

Won si feracis occupet Africae 

Quidquid prsealtis conditur horreis , 
Gemmasque lucentes , et auri 
Possideat rutilos acervos. 

Nee ille felix , qui valet omnium 

Caussas latentes cernere , sidera 
Notare doctus , et profundas 
Ingenio penetrare terras. 

Sed tu beatum jure vocaveris 

Qui niente pura rite Deum colit, 



152 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Ejusque jussa ducit amplis 
Divitiis pretiosiora. 

Non ille vulgi gaudet honoribus ; 

Sed carus ipsi Numinis est honos ; 
Pro quo tuendo non recusat 
Dedecorum genus omne ferre. 

Quin et relictis coetibus urbium 

Mens ejus altum transvolat sethera^ 
Deique summi , cselitumque 
Colloquio fruitur beato. 

Cselestis ergo jam sapientige 

Plenus ^ periclis altior omnibus 
Quiescit in Deo, furentum 
Despiciens hominum tumultuSii 

Sic proeliantes ajquore turgido 

Ventos reducto montis in angulo 
Miratur, et gaudet procella 
Terribili procul esse pastor. 



Ad Donatum Rulliim* 

Quis cuncta possit , Rulle , pericula ^ 
Motusque mentis dicere turbidos 
Qui ssevientis ins tar undae 
Nos variis agitant procellis ? 

Hinc prceliatur sollicitus timor , 

Hinc spes bonorum credula , gaudium 
Nunc toUit alte, nunc doloris 
Dejiclmur furibundo ab aestu. 

Non sic benignus coelicolum pater 

Humana finxit corda ; sed insolens 
Nos fastus ad tumultuosa 
Usee freta praecipites adegit i 



M. ANTONIUS FLAMmiUS. 153 

Cum vita nultis ante laboribus 

Turbata cunctis afflueret bonis ; 

Nee mortis occurrens imago 

Cor trepido quateret tumultu. 
Quod ergo tantis auxilium est malis ? 

Ecquid Platonis docta volumina, 

Cultique prseceptor Lycsei 

Sollicitam recreare mentem , 
Modumque curis figere tristibus 

Possunt ? vel auri perpetuo fluens 

Rivus ? vel in sublime tollens 

Per titulos popularis aura? 
Fomenta sunt base prorsus inania ; 

Luduntque falsa vulgus imagine; 

Vulgique primores acuti 

Viribus ingenii tumentes. 
At tu beatam ducere si cupis 

Vitam , periclis liber ab omnibus 

Adhaereas Deo , piaque 

Mente sacrum venerare numen. 
Hinc hauries veram et sapientiam , 

Verumque bonorem , el divitias; ferus 

Quas nee tyrannus , nee tremendi 

Vis rapiat truculenta belli. 
Quidquid bonorum cernitur uspiam , 

Hoc fonte manat : quo sine 
Tetrasque, caelitumque regna 

Possideat, miser usque vivet. 



De Joviano Pontano^ 

Qui cecinit claro fulgentia lumina caelo 
Pontani doctis versibus Urania , 

20 



154 THE AlVTI- CRITIC 

Phoebe, tuis magnam lucem addidit ignibus , utque 
Nunc melius iiiteant sidera cuncta , facit. 



De Joanne Coita. 



Si fas cuique sui sensus expromere cordis, 

Hoc equidem dicam , pace, Catulle, tua : 

Est tua Musa quidem dulcissima; Musa "videtur 
Ipsa tamen Cottae dulcior esse mihi. 



Ad Balthasarem Castilionem. 

Si truculenta ferox irrumpis in agmina Marte , 
Diceris invicto Castilione satus. 

At molli cilhara si condis amabile carmen , 
Castalia natus diceris esse Dea. 



Ad eundem. 



Horrida terribilis cum tractas arma , Maronis 
Castilione tui carmine digna facis. 

Idem cum molli vacuus requiescis in umbra 
CastalivB , aeterno digna Maroue canis. 



Ad Andr. Nuugerium, 

Naugeri , ne quis tibis certet , neve laboret 
Incassum , laudes sequiparare tuas : 

Sive Epigramma facis juncto pede , sive soluta 
Defies magnanimum funera acerba virum. 



M. ANTONIUS FLAMINIU9. 155 

Ad Eundem. 

Quot Bruma creat albicans pruinas , 
Quot tellus Zephyro soluta flores , 
Quot splcB Libycis calent in agris , 
Quot vindemia porrigit racemos, 
Quot vastis mare fluctuat procellis , 
Cum nascens pluvias reportat hsedus , 
Quot Ceraunia frondibus teguntur, 
Quot caelum facibus micat serenum 5 
Quot sunt millia multa basiorum, 
Qu:e dari sibi postulat Catullus , 
Quotque sunt atomi Lucretianae 
Tot menses , bone Naugeri , tot annos 
Vivent aureoli tui libelli. 



Ad Actium Sannazarium. 

Quantum Virgilio debebat silva Maroni, 

Et pastor , donee Musa Maronis erit ; 

Tantum paene tibi debent piscator , et acta , 
Acti, divino proxime Virgilio. 



Gasp. Contareno. 

Contarene , tuo docuisti magne libello , 
Extinctis animas vivere corporibus. 

Ergo jure tui vivunt monumenla laboris , 
Et vivent sseclis innumerabilibus. 



156 THE ATfTI-CRITIC 

Ad Marium Molsam. 

Postera dum numeros dulces mirabitur aetas, 

Sive , Tibulle , tuos , sive , Petrarcha , tuos : 

Tu quoque , Molsa , pari semper celebrabere fama ; 
Vel potius titulo duplice major eris. 

Quidquid enim laudis dedit inclita Musa duobus 
Vatibus ; hoc uni donat habere tibi. 



XLVIIL 

Tragic Tales. Coningsbj ^ and Brokenhm st. By 
Sir Egerton Brydges, Bar^ London^ R, Trip" 
hook. 1 vol. 8.*' 1820. 



Written by a Friend for a Periodical Publication. 

What may have been the success of these Tales, or 
•whether any success at all has attended them , we know 
not : but we know , that the present taste of the Public 
is all for glare and extravagance; and that whatever trusts 
to those forms and colours of composition , which gained 
the approbation and excited the deliglit of former ages , 
has little chance of raising the notice or pleasing the pam^ 
pered appetite of our own time. That the public mind is 
in a sound state ; and that literature is not rapidly decli- 
ning into frightful corruption , will scarcely be asserted by 
any well-informed , pure , and temperate mind. 

This false taste is spread though every part of learning , 



TRAGIC TALES. 157 

or authorship ; but it prevails most in the department of 
Fiction. And among its ruling causes may be certainly as- 
cribed the character of modern Periodical Criticism; which 
having become a lucrative trade or profession , has given 
itself up to follow rather than lead the prejudices and pas- 
sions of the multitude. Nothing is written in the sober temper 
of a Judge ; but every thing with the partiality , the heat , 
and exaggeration of an Advocate, 

Truth , moral sagacity, virtuous and amiable sentiment , 
natural beauty , the movements of the heart , and the un- 
forced visions of the fancy , are the same in all ages and 
all nations among a civihzed people : and if there be a 
country , which in a late sera of society imagines that it 
has arisen to a degree of illumination and splendor , which 
eclipses former lights , and makes the past appear feeble , 
flat , and insipid , it ought to reverse its own self-conceit 
and to be taught by the difference, that the violence of its 
own glare must be factitious and impure. 

Milton talks of the « sober certainty of bliss » : there 
is a sober certainty of knowlege also in classical compo- 
sitions , which does not first surprize and then satiate , 
like the forced , hot-bed , high-seasoned dishes of modern 
composition , which are lashed up int© foam , and driven 
by false effort into cloudy shapes of monstrous chimy^ros. 

No writer has ever long enjoyed fame , who has given 
himself up to write what was plausible , rather than what 
was true. The plausible writer may easily be piquant , stri- 
king; and, to half-informed readers , amusing , so long as 
the prevailing prejudices and fashions , which he fiafters , 
continue to rule : but as these subside , the incredulus odi 
soon comes ; the charlatanism is detected ; and the tempo- 
rary favourite is cast away for an impostor. 

If our knowlege of human naiuro did not render us fami- 
liar with its perpetual inconsistencies both of conduct and 



158 THE ATfTI-CRITIC 

opinion , we should wonder at the contradictoriness of the 
multitude; who, while they clamour for what is practical, 
most delight in those freaks of the fancy which are most 
remote from probability. 

If History is Mor-al Philosophy teaching by example, 
Poetry and Fable are Moral Philosophy personified by Fancy. 
If what is personified be not Truth , it is spurious ; and 
it may be added , not the fruit of genuine and solid genius. 
We do not mean Truth in its narrow sense of matter of 
fact : We extend it to the mental movements ; to all those 
visionary appearances , and internal impulses , which are 
native to the intellect , and the soul. 

There are chords in the human heart , which Genius 
alone knows how to touch ; which are not awakened by 
what is external ; which rise uncalled only in the secret 
temple , where Genius presides ; and which Genius only 
can direct , so as to arouse them from the sleep which 
they have no power of their own to shake off. This is not 
said lightly and unmeaningly : it springs from a doctrine 
long considered , and maturely digested. 

We say that the inventions that do not arise from this 
source , and are not adapted and directed to excite these 
chords , are not the inventions of genius. The mind can 
make technical combinations , like the material hand ; but 
they have no more soul than the cold stone worked into 
the human form. 

Secondary authors mistake particularity and caprice for 
originality ; they think that superiority consists in difference. 
It is the reverse of this ; it is in conformity to what is 
already in the minds of others , that the merit lies. It is 
true , that it must go beyond the materials of this visible 
world : it must enter into the world of spirits : it must 
draw forth intellectual existences : but then it must delineate 
them in forms and colours congenial to their nature; and 



TRAGIC TALES* 459 

ndt in the fantastic shapes, whicli artifice substitutes, for 
want of admission to their mysteries. 

If it be true , ( as it certainly is ) , that « The proper 
study of mankind is man , » the highest department of this 
study , is his intellectual , not his material , nature. What- 
ever unfolds the scenes and feelings , that exist in those 
deep recesses ; whatever embodies the evanescent figures , 
that haunt a rich imagination ; contributes to the stores of 
that species of knowlege , yhic'i justly ranks among the 
most sublime and the most useful. 

Providence has formed us continually to aspire after 
something better, than the coarse realities that surround us. 
The intellectnal image associates with the picture of what 
is external a colouring , which it receives from within. The 
literary productions , which contribute thus to foster our 
better natures , and elevate ourselves above the meaner 
parts of our being , claim and merit a distinguished place. 

The niceties of the human character ; the conflicts between 
the good and the bad , of those who mingle opposite qua- 
lities of intellect and of virtue ; the tendency of particular 
errations of the mind or of the heart , the charm of those 
emanations of goodness , which vivid feehngs , directed by 
sublime principles, bring forth, — are subjects worthy of 
being painted ; and worthy the toils of the noblest genius. 

This opinion may perhaps seem to lift into a rank, which 
they have not hitherto held, a large portion of those modern 
Fictions which go under the name of Novels. But such an 
inference would not be just. The Novels of the author of 
Waverley may claim this praise to themselves : but there 
is a force of intellect ; a justness of thinking ; a skill of 
composition ; a propriety of words j a vividness of feeling 
and of fancy; in all of which the common manufacture 
of productions which go under this name is wanting. Their 
interest lies in the mere excitement of a vulgar curiosity 



160 THE AlVTI-CTtTTKl 

created by the developcmeiit of a complicated story. If the 
reader looks back , he cannot find in them a single pas- 
sage worthy of being cited ^ or which can rest on its own 
merit. 

Though that part of the Intellectual faculties , which is 
called the Understanding , or Reason , can never constitute 
genius , yet it may be doubted if a high degree of genius 
can exist without the addition of a large portion of this 
quality We have seen therefore those who have been dis- 
tinguished for their powers of invention , eminent also in 
various other walks of literature , and mental power. 

We suspect that the author of these Tales may have 
been blamed for giving any part of the days of his ma- 
turer years to this sort of imaginative indulgence. Such 
censures will have arisen from not making the distinctions 
we have endeavoured to enforce in the preceding para- 
graphs. 

The contemners of Poetry, and of that portion of prose , 
which partakes of poetical invention , are men of narrow 
minds and sterile hearts, who know not what real poetry 
is : and who mistake for it those abortions, and funguses, 
and tinsel gew gaws , which pretenders put forth ; and 
the foolish mob eulogise. Such things they may well con- 
sider the amusement of foolish and unthinking youth ; and 
light-headed and ignorant age. 

The fancy , that is stirred by the heat of youthful blood , 
is of an earthly and groveling nature. But genuine fancy , 
the pure and spiritual part of our being , becomes stronger, 
and glows more brightly with age. 

Both the Stories of these Tragic Tales are exceedingly 
gloomy : and some persons have wondered , under what 
mood of mind the author could imagine , ( if he did ima- 
gine ), such distressing events ; and if he did not imagine 
them , where he found the outline of such foul murders. -^ 



TRAGIC TALES. 161 

There are traces about them , as if he had somewhere heard 
the reality of such things. — Coningshy was pronounced 
by a gentleman of deep consideration , when he perused 
the Tale , to be a character quite new among the mul- 
titudes which Novels have exhibited. Why should it not 
have arisen from a fancy turning its vision inward upon 
the operations of a passionate and vigorous mind long 
brooding in solitude over its own prejudices and violences, 
and working itself at last into furies , which reason could 
not controul ? It is the business of a true, native, unfac- 
titious fancy, to behold these things in their progress ; to 
have the secrets of the heart opened to it ; and to see the 
future and the distant in the present ! — 

To copy the human character , as is appears under the 
disguises of society , is to represent a deceitful surface. The 
energies that are bred and grow up in solitude within the 
unseen recesses of the soul , are hid from the observer of 
daily life : the fancy alone can penetrate them ; the mind 
that creates , only , can develop their movements. 

The truth of characters drawn from these sources stands 
upon a certainty, which no study of external individuality 
can reach. The represented connection therefore between 
moral causes and moral effects is more unerring : and the 
instruction far deeper than the lessons afforded by what 
are called portraits of actual living beings. 

If all the world were engaged in providing for the ne- 
cessities of the day ; if all were occupied in promoting their 
own private interests , the indulgence of fancy would be 
an obstacle to their purposes , which ought to be sedu- 
lously excluded rather than encouraged. But Providence has 
happily ordered it otherwise : it has left in civilized society 
no inconsiderable portion independent , and at leisure for 
intellectual pursuits. For these, Avhatever is adapted to aid 
the exercise of the best of our mental powers ; whatever 



162 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

elevates, or refines the thouglit; whatever assists the con- 
nection between language and the shadowy tribes of ideas ; 
whatever seizes those transient impressions of the heart , 
which come and go so quick, that they allow no leisure 
to study them , are acquisitions , which the profound philo- 
sopher, and generous moralist, will know how to appre- 
ciate. 

To purge the human heart , and extract from it the first 
incipient seeds of crime, by holding out a terrific picture 
of its progress and its consequences, has been promulgated 
by critics from early ages to be the purpose of Tragedy. 
Lord Brohenhurst is a dreadful Tale : but perhaps it is , 
notwithstanding , much too short. The wickedness of Lady 
Brokenhurst has been thought by some to outrage all pro- 
bability : but when once the furious passions become writhed 
with obliquity and cunning , and have risen to a certain 
degree of ascendance , who shall say where they will stop ? 

If this character be a picture of female depravity and 
horror , the author makes amends by his character of 
Adelinde Coningsby , who is all purity , and loveliness and 
spirit ; 

« A faery vision 

Of some gay creature of the element, 
That in the colours of the rainbow lives , 
And plays i' the plighted clouds : » 

a creature made to be worshipped ; to turn humanity into 
celestial ; to illuminate deserts ; and soften the savages of 
the woods. But a Being so good was not calculated for 
long happiness here : her sun soon sets in violence , and 
horror ! 

The author delights himself with these images of gloom 
and tempest. He has a melancholy view of life ; and evi- 
dently clings to sorrow as the congenial inmate of his 



TRAGIC TALES. 163 

bosom. But it cannot be asserted, that sorrow has closed 
his heart, his curiosity, or his mental activity. Always en- 
quiring , expatiating , analysing , combining , he has never 
suffered the ills of life to palsy him , nor gigantic disap- 
pointments to turn to gall the native glow of his spirit. 
The enthusiasm , that was his earliest characteristic _, remains 
unabated in his latest writings. 

If the Autographical Memoirs , which are said to have 
been seen by some of his friends, shall ever appear, it will 
be proved that the accusation of querulousness , a word 
which implies complaint without adequate cause, has been 
most unjustly applied to the author. The variety of acts 
of injustice, to which he has been a victim; the ingrati- 
tude , the treachery , and neglects he has experienced _, have 
drawn forth enduring testimonies of his fortitude rather 
than of his querulousness. 

The great difference between an original writer and 
those who take advantage of the topics of the day to exer- 
cise their memories, and apply their ingenuity in specious 
productions of factitious interest, is well-known to all pro- 
found readers. The number of the former class , in any 
age , is small. Quickness and force of apprehension , power 
of memory , and facility of language, are not uncommon. 
But how few are they, who think for themselves? All the 
rest will live their little day and be forgotten. The bor- 
rowed is not at the first moment discriminated from that 
which originates in the writer's mind : but the difference 
shews itself with time : the want of vital spirit suffers it 
to fade. The elasticity of genius cannot be destroyed by 
paisfortune; or enfeebled by neglect. 



164 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

XLVIIL 
HALL OF HELLINGSLEY. 



The scene of this Tale is laid in one of the Midland 
Counties approaching towards the West. The time the reign 
of king James the First. It took its origin from an incident 
which forms the subject of an actual tradition still prevai- 
ling in a certain village regarding a Branch of a noble Fa- 
mily then resident there ; and which the Author heard on 
the spot nearly 40 years ago. What parts are mere inven- 
tion ; and what parts have reference to private history , it 
would be indelicate and useless to distinguish. The period 
chosen appears to afford various materials of striking inte- 
rest. The Characters of that age have been sufficiently elu- 
cidated; and are strongly associated in our memories. They 
do not approach us too near; so as to allow no play to 
the fancy. Nobility in those days was a distinct race, which, 
though Philosophy and Liberalism may rejoice in having 
destroyed it , at least affords splendid or strongly-coloured 
pictures to the Imagination. 

Nothing is intended in this Tale , of minute Manners ; 
of what is called a tact at the little technical outward forms 
of society; forms which change with every generation; and 
perhaps two or three times in every generation ; so that 
what thirty years ago was all interest because it caught 
« the manners living as they rise , » now appears tedious , 
ridiculous , and revolting. With what ennui we now turn 
from all the tiresome ceremonial, and si iff costume of mo-? 
mentary fashion, with which so large a portion of Richard-^ 



HALL OF HELLINGSLEY." 165 

son's endless volumes of Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison 
is stuffed ; and yet at the time , the greatest proportion of 
readers thought these things the great charm of those works. 
The allusion to manners , which two Centuries have left 
behind , is quite different : whenever traces of them remain 
upon the memory, they remain because they were intrin- 
sically interesting. All that was frivolous, dull, and absurd; 
all that had not the sparks of life in it , has long since 
faded away ; and ceased to leave the speck of an im- 
pression. 

It is the Vast that the Poet and the romance - inventor 
find the expanded field , which they require. If they offend 
against poetical probability; the illusion, it ^is their business 
to create , is gone. But yet if they do not heighten nature ; 
if they do not select , nor recombine from what is beau- 
tiful or grand , they do not perform the work of genius. 
The latitude for this probability is better found in the Vast. 
Distance softens : Time hallows : we are not willing to allow 
in our cotemporaries the high traits we can believe in ages , 
that are gone. There is room also for more curiosity , more 
novelty , and surprise in a story of other days. We enter 
it with a spirit more awakened ; our fancy is more active . 
and our credulity is more disposed to favour it. It is true , 
that the purchasers of Tales of Fiction are various ; and 
ought to be various , that they may be .suited to various 
tastes. Some read that they may have their knowledge of 
characters of the day sharpened ; that they may improve 
their skill in the prevailing opinions ; and gaze upon the 
pictures of the bustle in which they delight to be en- 
I gaged. 

Others desire to have their fancy exercised ; tlelr sen'i- 
ments exalted ; and the more shadowy fpcuUies of ibeir 
minds gratified and strengthened. 

If attention to what is called practical, io a sort of habit 



166 THE ANTT-CRITIC 

of mental discipline necessary to those , whose duties call 
on them to qualify themselves for most of the numerous 
vocations of daily routine; and whom too refined a sensi^ 
bility and too abstract sentiments would withdraw from 
their labours , or disgust with their employments , there are 
numerous others , to whom the opposite intellectual culti- 
vations are as necessary as they are delightful. 

The present Novel is ( if the author is not mistaken ) , 
written on those principles , and in that taste , which ac-^ 
tuates 3i poetical Invention; with the selection, the fervor, 
the picturesque circumstantiality ; the enthusiasm , the be- 
lieving delusion , which characterize , or ought to charac- 
terise , the fictions of Poets. 



XLIX. 

THE FOUNTAm OF HELICON. 

Written Majxh 3i. 1891. 

Rock'd by the roaring winds to sweet repose ,, 
Luxurious slumbers lull'd my w^eary limbs , 
Through the long darkness of a winter night !; 
I rose ; and open'd to my searching eye 
The roll of ages past : I mused and saw 
Visions before me : then I bent my ear; 
And thought I heard soft voices in the air. 
Next I revolved the studious page : and thus 
Day pass'd , like sable night , in inward joy. 
Hours glided on ; and weeks ; and rapid months ;: 



HELICON. 167 

And mind began to overcome this frame 
Of mortal clay ; and turn this groveling dross 
Half into spirit : wings uplifted me ; 
And bore me through the clouds. When heaviness 
Sat on my eyes; and shed Morphean dews; 
Fancy array 'd a brighter world within ; 
And when I waked, I lived as if in dreams. 
The woes of Earth, contrasted with the bhss, 
That shone upon my soul , improved its hues ; 
And made it glow more glorious (i). In the heavens 
The lovely Spring had just began her course; 
And the young bud disclosed the earliest leaf ; 
And the first tender green had just put forth 
Its emerald mantle o'er the shooting grass : 
When having bask'd beneath the genial beams 
That through the azure canopy above 
Transparent shone , and courted the young Hours j 
( Whose hair with primrose , and with violet 
Circled , threw balmy incense to the breeze ; 
Whose bosoms , like the early opening bud 
In its first swell , threw rapture on my sight ), 
I cast my limbs exhausted on a bank , 
Where the soft radiance melted me to sleep. 
Then seem'd as if a Spirit touch'd my brow; 
And pierced mine eyelids ; and it said to rae^ 
« An holy fire, has caught thee ! Keep it pure | 
Nurse it; and fan it : and it will perchance 
Enoble , and illumine that frail form 
Of earthly substance ; and thy purged eye 
Shall see , what is to mortal view forbid ! » 

[i] The hues of bliss more brightly glow. 
Chastised by sabler tints of Woe. 

Gray. 



168 THE ANTi-CRITIC 

And then a sudden hlaze appear'd to shoot 
Across the face of this terrestial globe i 
And then a momentary striking up 
Of harps celestial : when the rapture rush'd 
Through all my veins j and suddenly I woke ! 



LX. 

EGOTISMS. 

Extract of a Letter, July V^ 1821. 

It is variety in mental gifts, which can alone lead to en- 
during distinction in the intellectual world. As we encou- 
rage one , or the other , by fits , it takes the temporary mas- 
tery , and gives the temporary character to our faculties : 
whether it be faitcy , or sentiment _, or reason , or memory. 

• The same person may therefore at different periods of 
life exhibit a very different intellectual character. 

It is not unreasonable to wish to be fairly estimated , 
because the power of impressing the opinions we believe 
to be right , greatly depends on the consideration in which 
Y/e are held. My vanity has been long cured ; and I have 
' long learned to work with little hope of notice and en- 
couragement; but it is this sentiment which sometimes 
makes me endeavour to set myself right ; at least with my 
friends. 

I do this with incessant variety. I feed my mind, it is 
true , with such infusions as are but of litlle use except to the 



EGOTISMS. 169 

owner, if he has no power but to pour them out just in 
the same state in which they were poured in. But I hope 
that I always make use of them for the purpose of new 
combination ; to suggest ; to illustrate ; to confirm ; to 
expand; to qualify; to distinguish; to generalize ; to sharpen 
and strengthen the faculties ; to enrich the imagination ; 
and to ameliorate the heart. 

It is easy to be a Book - Maker ; and in this sense to 
be an Author. But it is not easy, or common , to produce 
what is original, forcible, just, profound, important, and 
eloquent. In this I do not dare hope I have been successful; 
but to this I have aspired. 

At twenty two I produced a volume of Poems, to which 
I look hack not with dissatisfaction. If there can be traced 
in it , not the common place of a ready memory , but the 
conformity of individual fancy and sentiment to the models 
of our best schools; especially of the juvenile poems of Milton, 
I am willing to hope that it may yet last longer , than some 
of these temporary meteors of whim and glare ». 



AGAIK. 



« Sometimes I flatter myself that age has improved rather 
than lessened my faculties ; that it has not only mellowed , 
but extended my reflections ; that it has fortified my know- 
ledge ; and given it a firmness and practicability , which 
it wanted. In those tempestuous six years . which I passed 
in Parliament, my mind partook of the character of my 
situation , and of the character of the times. It had flashes 
of broad light , intermixed with darkness , and bewilder- 
ments and mazes. I look Lack with astonishment and 
trembling at the fortitude , or the bhndness, that could 

22 



170 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

pass such a period of stupendous trials , and gigantic dangers 
and sorrows ! 

On such occasions , it is constant occupation and want 
of time to reflect , that carries us through : But this very 
thing is at the same time injurious to just thinking , and 
a sound state of mind. We have a fihn before our eyes; 
and are necessitated to see things in delusive colours ! The 
truth is too powerful for us ! » 



LXI. 

EGOTISMS CONTINUED. 

Extract of another Letter , i5 September 1821. 

« Nature chose to give me a peculiarity of character; tb 
make me the victim of anxieties , about which others care 
little ; to give me uneasy ambitions , which never can be 
satisfied; to be constantly grasping perplexities, which 
neither visit , nor sieze on other minds ! To be beating 
at the door which opens to the penetralia of the heart , 
when others skim gaily and lightly over life. 

I do not pride myself on this peculiarity of conformation 1 
I regret it ! It is disease; it gives a barbed hook to thoughts, 
which renders them incapable of being extracted from my 
brain. 

It was no whim, no accident that devoted me to lite- 
rature. It was the food , on which alone my mind was 
formed to live • it furnished the only nourishment , with 
which the seeds, that were sown in my intellect, could be 
well cultivated ! 



EGOTISMS CONTINUED. 171 

There are many, who would say , that such a description, 
if true , will account for the unsuccessful course of my 
life. Such a person cannot bend to circumstances ; cannot 
keep attention alive to petty expediencies : cannot watch 
individual interests : but is in search of what is general ; 
of what is wise and just on a large scale : whereas indi- 
vidual advantages are commonly gained at the expence of 
the general good ! While I write these sentences , I again 
doubt the propriety ot stuffing the columns of a letter with 
them ! They have something too recherche : too subtle , and 
remote from the ordinary subjects of interest. 

On the other hand , such elucidations , if the occasion 
that prompts them is lost , die in the mind , and are per- 
haps never revived again ! Every conquered thought , every 
evanescent distinction , which is fixed by language , is a gain 
in the fields of Intellect ! Original thinkers are so rare , 
that even among eminent writers , not one in ten , merits 
this praise ». • 



« I suppose, that in Society every man will be attacked 
on the side of his tendencies ! Mine have always been 
towards those speculative and visionary habits , which men 
of the world disapprove so much, and hate so much. I am 
always therefore bored with hints and praises of what 
people are pleased to call « practical sense » and « tact of 
real life «. Yet many of these folks call themselves severe 
and scrupulous moralists; and claim also the merit of strict 
and punciiiious religion. But when we come to examine 
them , in what does this practical sense consist ? — -In the 
non-application of their own rules , and principles : in ex- 
ceptions : in expedients : in freedom from scrupulosity : in 
taking the rule v/hen it is convenient , and rejecting it , 
when it is in the v/ay 1 Then, what is the undeniable in-r 
ference ? 



172 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

That their principles and professions are all talk , to serve 
their own purposes : that they have no sincerity ! — If the 
principles are true , the exceptions are very rare ; and expe- 
dients are always dangerous. 

If they believe that society can only go on by expedients , 
let them have the boldness and honesty to say so ! If they 
believe , that a man is justified and wise in choosing only 
what is for his own private interest ; and that all sound 
sense directs such conduct ; let them be frank knaves , and 
declare it ! But lying and hypocrisy for the sake of indi- 
vidual and selfish advantage , is of all profligacies one of 
the most revolting ! 

As practical good therefore is so often in opposition to 
virtue , it appears to me , that this consideration alone 
affords a most powerful encouragement of intellectual plea- 
sures. In these alone , after all , must consist the rewards of 
virtue. — lliches, station, material enjoyments, are not to be 
gained by it. — It is in the mind alone , in the consciousness 
within , that the satisfaction must be found. But the mind 
will not produce fruit , that is not cultivated and prepared 
for it. The highest talents must be always at work : the 
lights of the mind are often as transient and changeable , 
as those of the rainbow. ■ — To catch them distinctly ; and 
to find language for them , can only be effected by per- 
})etual efforts. — The seeds of the intellect die in the soil , 
if not perpetually tended , and aided : and foul and noxious 
jilants spring up in their place. 

Theoretic Goodness may not always be attended by con- 
sistency of conduct : — but in proportion as our principles 
are right , we shall probably approach Goodness in action ! 
But what is the worth of his Goodness , whose acts are 
good; but whose mind is base and vicious? 

On this account I ihink aU Fictions dangerous , and even 
positively hurtful , which are formed to give additional 



SIR RALPH WILLOUGHBY. 173 

attractions to merely plausible characters ; wliich recom- 
mend that adroitness in daily conduct, which already more 
than sufficiently recommends itself. It is the duty, and ought 
to be constant struggle of the moral Tale-writer, to set in full 
display all the Retired virtues ; all those , in which a man 
may justly say : « Wlea virtute me involvo : » in which 
« the sunshine of the soul » makes amends for the storms , 
that « darken and growl without ». 



LXIL 

Sir Ralph Willoughhy. An Historical Tale, By- 
Sir Egerton Brydges, Bar> Florence 1820, 8.° 



This Tale was written at Florence , while confined to a 
Sofa by illness, in the three first months of 1821. It com- 
mences with a reference to the Rebellion of the Earls of 
Westmoreland and Northumberland , in the reign of Queen 
Elisabeth. Ralph Willoughby is the son of an imaginary 
Nobleman attainted for his concern in that rebellion ; and 
Avho having fled abroad , was obliged to educate his infant 
children there. 

Ralph having thus become familiar with the Continental 
languages , was recommended to the Foreign Department 
of Lord Rurleigh's office ; where having attracted the favour 
of one of Burleigh's daughters , he raised the jealousy of 
his fellow-clerks ; and was finally ousted hy their intrigues 
and machinations. 

The incidents of his life till the close of the Reign are 
then related : and this gives an opportunity to introduce 



174 THE Al>rTr-CRITIC 

the characters of tlie most illustrious persons of EHsabeth's . 
Court. The Earls of Oxford ; Cumberland ; Nottingham ; 
Lord Grey of Wilton ; Lord Buckhurst ; Lord Hunsdon ; 
Sir Francis Walsingham ; Sir John Norris ; Sir Walter 
Raleigh , etc. , to whom Spenser wrote Dedicatory Sonnets 
prefixed to his Fairy Queen, are all introduced, together 
with the Sonnets themselves. 

Then commences, with the Reign of James _, that alledged 
Plot known by Raleigh's name , which remains an histori- 
cal mystery to this day. 

Here Raleigh , and Cobham , and Lady Arabella Stuart , 
come into full play. Willoughby , who had been already 
knigh'ed by K. James in his progress to take possession of 
the Throne , was now exposed to the maneuvres of Raleigh , 
for the purpose of procuring him to take a part in the 
political schemes of Raleigh , whatever they were. 

An occasion is then taken to attempt to develop and de- 
lineate the secret movements of Raleigh's character. Some 
friends of the Author have thought this portrait too severe. 
If it be true , it will excite regret : • — but truth must be. 
told at the expence of regret. An author is bound to speak 
according to the tenor of his own conviction. 

Raleigh was a very splendid character ; but there are 
many strong circumstances , on which to ground a suspi- 
cion of the goodness of his heart. His daring temper made 
him not very nice in his feelings ; and his boundless am- 
bition overcame a strict regard to means. 

Willoughby is represented as regarding Raleigh with 
admiration mixed with fear and doubt ; and as parrying his 
deep designs with sagacity and brilliant skill : as possessed 
of Rlieigh's talents , without his faults : as sincere , pure ; 
full of fancy , imagination , and sentiment : of an ambition 
controuled by reason , and cured by disappointment. His 
passion is solitude , and literature ; and the exercise of his 
nventive genius in poetical composition. 



SIR RALPH WILLOUGHBY. 175 

But Ms solitude , and his innocent and virtuous occu- 
pations, do not protect him against the visitations and the 
schemes of Raleigh , who discovers him in his retreat , 
and uses every persuasion to draw him again into active 
life. WiLLOUGHBY is superior to these temptations ; to these 
bewilderings and false lights of the mind , to which minor 
abilities would have been victims , when played off by a 
man of the splendid powers and deep management so pre- 
dominant in the tempter. But he was not conlenied to guard 
himself alone : his generous spirit resolved to afford a shield 
to Lady Arabella Stuart , whatever danger might be in- 
curred by it. 

When Raleigh left him, he visited this unfortunate Lady, 
though he was fully aware that it might aggravate the 
suspicions, which he toovvell knew were already opera- 
ting against him. He found her in want of all his advice , 
and all his consolation. But he paid dear for his genero- 
sity , and virtue. 

Salisbury , with whom he had been intimate when in the 
Office of Burleigh the father of this little , crooked , cun- 
ning , yet able Blinister , had now decided on his destruc- 
tion , because he would not betray Raleigh , however lie 
might disapprove some part of his conduct. 

The full occasion was now given. Lady Arabella , weak , 
guilesles, innocent, was the momentary puppet , whom the 
State set up to dread. Willoughby's secret visits were 
damning proofs of his guilt, Raleigh and Cobham , and 
Grey of Wilton, were sent to the Tower. Private warnings 
were sent to Willoughby of the blow about to be struck 
on him. Conscious of innocence , he scorned to fly. 
' The evil hour predicted came. He was sent to prison 5 
brought to trial for high treason in conspiring with Raleigh , 
Cobham , etc. to put Lady Arabella on the Throne ; found 
guilty on false evidence; and executed. 



176 THE ANTI -CRITIC 

Here ends the story. And « cui bono ? » cry the cold- 
hearted , the envious , and the malignant ? « Why represent 
your Hero as a man of talents; and give no proof of his 
talents ? Why represent him as unfortunate , arid unjustly 
deprived of reward and distinction , when you have given 
no proof that he deserved reward and distinction ? Is it 
for the purpose of indulging the querulousness to which 
you are so much addicted ? » 

What is thus meant by proof of talents , it is difficult to 
conceive ! Is it no proof of talent to have obtained a do- 
minion over the mind of Raleigh ? Is it no proof of talent 
to have written history and poetry , with sagacity , elo- 
quence , and genius ? « Oh but this is assertion : not proof ! » 
Happy cavillers , will any thing prevail over your passion 
to find fault? 

Ye amiable and contented Optimists! who think success 
the proof of merit , and have a calm confidence in the in- 
tegrity and justice of mankind ; who think that the perse- 
cuted are always in the wrong; and that malice , jealousy, 
and self-interest never operate against right; how I admire 
your scorn and indignation against those , who being the 
guilty authors of their own distresses and disappointments, 
dare to vent their bile against the innocent and benevolent 
world ! 

« It is sad (no douhtj to be persecuted with the rage of 
those , who are victims to their own imprudences 1 fVhy not 
let men quietly enjoy the profit and the credit , which have 
been awarded to them , in right of the excellent practical 
common sense, which is really the only talent worth a far- 
thing I We hiow very well that no one really acts , or 
talks , or writes , but for his own interest / How then can 
that be talent , which does not lead to the end sought? 
« Is not this logic? logic, which cannot be disputed! » 
O yes , certainly ; if unhappily the question itself were 
not begged ! — 



HISTORICAL TALE. 177 

All mankind then are engrossed by Self! there is no 
virtue , no sincerity , no conscience , no unmerconary love 
of literature ; no instrinsic love of sublimity or beauty ; no 
unbribed desire of fame , in the world ! « What ? » says 
Hudibras ; 

« What is the value of a thing , 

But as much money , as ^twill bring ? » 

What is the use therefore of a Poem, or a Romance, that 
vv^ill not fetch money ? « 

So thinks ; and so reasons the mass of vulgar minds. 



LIII. 

Le Forester. A Tale, 3 vols in-'^P ^ 1802. 



This Tale is also by the author of the present Work , 
who had suffered an interval of seventeen years to pass 
between the publication of productions of this class. 

The Story of this Fiction has an allusion to the cele- 
brated Jjiglesej Csi&e , which occurred before the Middle of 
the Last Century. Every person acquainted with Britisti Ge- 
nealogies knows this frightful Tale. Ptichard Annesley, the 
last Earl of Anglesey, succeeded his elder brother, 1727, 
in the Irish Barony of Altharn , on the supposition of his 
having died issueless : but many years afterwards , James 
Annesley claimed the titles and estates (to which the right 
to an English Earldom had also devolved, in 1737); as 
legitimate son and heir of Arthur Lord Altham , elder brother 
©f Earl Richard 5 stating himself to have h^^n kidnapped , 

'1% 



178 THE ANTI-CRITIO 

when a boy, by his uncle , and sent a slave to America. 
Between 1740 and i75o, the questi9n uas tried; and a 
verdict obtained in Ireland , after one of the longest , most 
laborious , and most Curious trials of filiation , that ever 
occurred before a Jury : a Trial , which fills a printed 
Folio volume. However the Earl, In possession of titles and 
estate,'), still foiled his unhappy nephew by writs of Error, 
etc., etc., and died without being di\esLed of his usurpations 
in 1 76 1, — while the claimant wore out his life in obscurity ; 
and died at last without issue male , not long after the 
same period. 

The Fiction of Le Forester was suggested by this ex- 
traordinary* series of Events : but it differs from it in 
many essential particulars. The Claimant is here finally 
successful , and recovers his rights. His moral and intel- 
lectual character are imaginar^f^, and almost all the inci- 
dents are equally so. It was the Father of Le Forester , 
who is here represented as kidnapped ; and not the hero 
himself. The part , in which the author supposes that he 
has been least unsuccessful , is that which relates the afflic- 
ting* and cruel circumstances attendinof this violence to the 
true heir , by an usurper so near in blood as a father's 
brother. 

The shipwreck on the coast of Madeira; the boyhood 
and youth passed in the depth of the wooded solitudes of 
North America ; the companions of that solitude ; the 
mode in which he passed his time ; and his attachment to 
the beautiful and innocent partner of his exile- these (it is be- 
lieved ) are written with the greatest flov/ ; and more under 
the impression of a predominant and believing Imagination 
than the rest. 

As this may be said to be in some degree an Episode , 
it cannot be denied that, to have thrown the greatest ia- 
erest upon it, is a fault. 



LE FORESTER. 17§ 

So it is : and it is too late to mend it. The truth is , 
that a large portion of this Part occurred to the author 
in the progress of the composition , when it was too far 
advanced to throw it into a less objectionable shape. 

Many years have passed since the writer has turned 
back his eyes on this Work. The impressions therefore , 
which remain upon him, may be indistinct and inaccurate. 

The value of a Plot, which raises the curiosity regarding 
the succession of events , and increases it as the reader 
goes forward , cannot be questioned. But if the whole 
interest consists in the developement of this succession, it 
ceases when the events are known. The interest therefore 
derived from sentiment , imagery , and reflection , is more 
lasting , if not so intense. 

In truth , it is of these that the Story ought to be the 
vehicle. If there be nothing of eloquence , or force , or 
depth, in these, the production will scarcely repay a second, 
perusal. But it seems as if the generality of Works of this 
class were content to rely solely on the interest to be raised' 
by novelty or surprize : for the incidents y with which they 
deal, have as little in them of fidelity and exactness , as they 
have of beauty or sublimity. 

It is sometimes difficult to account for the taste , which 
a coarse fancy exercises in the selection of its nutriment. 
It enjoys pictures which are as flat and as rude as reality, 
yet bear no likeness to it. If delineations have not the 
merit of likeness, let them have that of fairness, or grandeur. 
As the taste of the Multitude , if left to itself, always prefers 
the Dutch School of Painting , so it is most pleased with. 
Fictions , which affect to pourtray the scenes of familiar 
life. A faithful representation would be both instructive , and 
in a moderate degree interesting : but that , of which the 
only merit consists in exactness , is ineffably stupid when 
it is a bungling invention. 



180 THE A.NTI-CRITIC 

If all the various merits of plot , sentiment, imagination, 
reflection , and language can be united , no one will doubt 
tlie superiority of such a combination. The excitement of 
a well contrived Plot puts the reader in a state of mind 
prepared to receive every sentiment and every image with 
double force. 

For this reason it has always appeared to me , that 
pieces of poetry can no where be introduced with more 
effect thau in a well-contrived Tale. The reader is already 
worked up into a temperament congenial to the state they 
require : he has already obtained a familiarity with the 
character in which they are written , and a sympathy 
with it. 

. History and Biography , executed with that attention to 
facts , which is their essence , cannot have the same wide 
field for the communication of the highest treasures of the 
mind. 

If these observations are just , the principles which are 
founded on them , will guide the judgement rightly in de- 
ciding on the merit of Tales of Fiction. There must be 
Invention ; but it must be under the controul of sagacity 
and knowlege of mankind : there must be lively feeling ; 
and a skill in composition ; a command of elegant , if not 
nervous diction. 

If thus executed , such a work may be put among the 
treasures of Moral Philosophy teaching by Example. 



ARTHUR FITZALBINI. 181 



LIV. 



Arthur Fitzalhini. A No^el^ i vol. 8.^ (Oct. 1 798 ) , 
2.^ Edit, (^March) 1799. 

The Bibliotheque Britannique^ vol. VI, p. 182 , 
has given the following Critique on this Novel. 



« L'objet principal de I'Auteur de ce Roman paroit etre 
de plaider la cause de la naissance centre la fortune. II 
represente Televation de sentiment et le dissinteressement 
parfait , comme I'apanage exclusif des personnes de liaut 
rang. II voudroit remettre a la mode un prejuge qui a bien 
vielli en peu d'annees , et que la plus simple observation 
suffit a detruire. 

Pvien de moins complique que la Fable de Roman. Fitzalbini, 
jeune homme d'une famille noble et pauvre , a toutes les 
preventions de la noblesse ; 11 manque I'occasion d'epouser 
un herelier de la Cite , et s'attache a une Demoiselle de 
haute naissance , et sans fortune. Celle-ci obteint enfin un 
heritage considerable , et le marriage s'arrange : mais I'ex- 
treme sensibilile de cette jeune personne lui donne une 
maladie , dont elle meurt. 

Ce Roman est evidement sorti d'une plume fort exerce , 
et si Ton passe les prejuges de son Auteur, on est force 
de lui reconnoitre une morale tres pure , et un style tres 
attachant. » — 

The censures on Birth contained in this criticism were 
appropriate to the time and place in which they were 
published. It was during the domination of the Republican 



82 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Faction of the French Revolution. But it is curious that , 
as far as my observation goes , the Government under which 
the influence of Birth is more practically operative than in 
any other , is that of the Jittle Republic of Geneva. 

They , who call the respect for Birth a prejudice , and 
endeavour to turn into ridicule this alledged prejudice , 
entirely misrepresent the opinions and reasonings of those 
who favour it. Wo rational man assumes that Providence 
assigns native talents or virtues to high descent. He says 
that the adventitious circumstances attendant on Birth are 
its better nurses. 

But the truth is that Birth can scarcely be said to form 
the main feature of this Tale. If there be any interest 
raised by the character of Fitzalbini, it is derived from the 
energetic qualities of his mind and his heart ; from the 
moral sensibility , which makes him the victim of his un- 
prosperous fortune ; from the deep and romantic colours 
with which his pathetic fancy invests the scenery and inci- 
dents , he is destined to. 

The clamours raised against the author for certain cha- 
racters introduced into this Novel , in which a few neigh- 
bours imagined that they saw their own portraits , have 
scarcely yet, at the distance of two and twenty j^ears , 
subsided. What is the proper licence in drawing portraits 
for works of Fiction ; and how far it is possible for an 
author entirely to detach from the operations of his fancy 
the impressions of his experience , are points not easy to 
be defined. 

Of the imprudence of any personalities there cannot be a 
doubt. An author of genius is ill adapted to cope with the 
vindictive temper of those who are affronted. His is a pas- 
sing arrow thrown out in sport , and forgotten. They 
work in the dark : their revenge never sleeps : and by 
falsehood , maneuvre , cunning , insinuation , and labour , 



MARY DE CLIFFORD. 183 

they make up for want of talent , knowlege , and weight 
of character. It is the plodder , that wins the long race ; 
not the swift _, or the strong. 

All the stupid and the foolish make a common cause , 
not only when attacked ; but when they suspect that they 
are aimed at. 

The First Edition of this Novel was , however , sold in 
a month. The delay in printing the Second Edition gave 
time for the public curiosity to cool. 

The want of Plot is certainly a defect in this produc- 
tion ; which overflows with the sentiments of a wounded 
and indignant heart. 



LV. 

Mary de Clifford , a Tale : interspersed with 
Poetry, London f Jan, J 1792. 



Nearly seven years had elapsed , since the author had 
published his Sonnets and other Poems, in March 1785; 
when this Novel appeared. He had felt a blight to the 
ardor of his temper by a reception which seemed to him 
cold : the visions of his fancy were extinguished in the 
bud ; and , like Collins , he resolved to write poetry no 
more. 

Having amused his broken spirit by studies which required 
less energy; less of that exhausting temperament in which 
poetry is formed ; having for these seven ;years whiled 
away much of his languid time in the plodding pursuits 



184 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

of a genealogist and antiquarian , a sudden blaze of 
native visions broke in upon him : the veil that stood be 
fore his fancy, was pierced by a reproach; and in a walk 
of an October morning, ( 1791), when the sun made an 
effort to pierce the congregation of grey vapoury mists that 
tottally enveloped the scene , there was something of such 
inspiring and marvellous beauty in the struggle , as to 
throw back upon the author the poet's mantle , and the 
poet's heart. 

Here, in the instant, he formed the design of Mary de 
Clifford ; and on his return to the House, began its com- 
position. The sheets were sent to the Press, as they were 
written. 

He had hitherto studied the model of Milton in his 
Sonnets. A very young writer surely does well to study 
good models , however original his native powers may be. 
The effect of this , however , in the present case , was to 
expose him among the critics to the charge of stiffness 
of manner. And this was particularly objected to his First 
Sonnet, written in 1782 , at the age of 19 , in the follow- 
ing words : 

SONNET. 

Askest thoii, why I court the slighted lyre? 

In hopes , thro' life 'twill cheer my steady way , 
Drawn by no worldly pomps nor cares , astray ; 
And give me passport to the heavenly Quire. 

The conscience, pure delight that I inspire ; 

And for good deeds alone pour forth the lay , 
No aid , my friend , to lead me calmly gay 
Thro' ignorance and envy will require. 

I strike the strings ; and strait my purged ear 

Hears not their praise , or blame For , if my songf 
Should , as it breathes , illume the brow of Care ; 



MARY DE CLIFFORD. 185 

The sluggard rouse ; or bear the Faint along , 
Shall I for Self alone have labour'd here ? 
O not the plea shall gain my soul heaven's tuneful throng. 



Another of these pieces was the following : 
SONNET , 

JVritten 3o Nov. 1784. 

This thy last day, dark Month, to me is dear; 
For this first saw mine infant eyes unbound ! 
Now two-and- twenty years have hasten'd round : 
Yet from the bud no ripen'd fruits appear ! 

My spirits drooping at the thought to cheer , 

By my fond friends the jovial bowl is crown 'd : 
Yet sad I sit , mine eyes upon the ground ; 
And scarce refrain to drop the silent tear. 

Yet , O beloved Muse , if in me glow 

Ambition for false fame , the thirst abate : 

Teach me, for fields and flocks, mankind to know; 

And ope mine eyes to all , that's truly great ! 

To vi'ew the world unmask'd on me bestow; 

And knaves and fools to scorn, howe'er adorn'd by state ! 



There is some satisfaction in recurring to such a test of 
opinions and principles held at so arly an age. Even then 
I resolved to prefer the study of moral and intellectual 
associations to those pure descriptions , whether of inani- 
mate or animate nature , which have no sympathy with 
the movements of the heart or the understanding. 

Pope says : 

« That not in Fancy's maze he wander'd long ; 
But stoop'd to Truth; and moralised his song. » 

24 



186 THE ANTJ- CRITIC 

The knowlege of the human character , not indeed in 
its orduiary operations, but in the conflict of energetic 
passions . is the noblest of all studies. 

The delineation of petty manners ; the exposure of the 
little absurdities of temporary fashion, is but a trifling 
employment of labour , and waste of ingenuity. 

The Painter , who poiirtrays, by the expression of the 
countenance and the form, the grander affections of the 
Soul, is universally acknowledged to be of a far superior 
rank to him, who draws the familiar and comic scenes of 
life. Every one is ashamed to own his preference to the 
latter. It is not so in literary works. The describer of 
« manners living as they rise » is one , with whom the 
generality of readers do not hesitate to own their more 
lively sympathy. 

But this is not the proper object of Fiction. « Lord 
Bacon , » says Blair , « takes notice of our taste for ficti- 
tious history , as a proof the greatness and dignity of the 
human mind. He observes very ingeniously that the objects 
of this world , and the common traits of affairs which we 
behold going on in it , do not fill the mind , nor give it 
entire satisfaction. We seek for something , that shall ex- 
pand the mind in a greater degree; we seek for more 
heroic and illustrious deeds 5 for more diversified and 
surprizing events ; for a more splendid order of tings ; a 
more regular and just distribution of rewards and punish- 
ments, than wjiat we find here : because we meet not with 
these in true history , we have recourse to fictitious. We 
create worlds according to our fancy, in order to gratify 
our capacious desires : Accommodando , says that great 
philosopher , rerum simulachra ad animi desideria , non 
suhmittendo aniinum rebus , quod ratio facit ; et historia (i). 

(i) Acconimodaling llie appearances of things to the desires of the 
mind ; not bringing down the mind , as history and philosophy 
do , to the course of events ». 



MARY BE CLIFFORD. 187 

Blair concludes this subject thus : 

« The trivial performances, which daily appear in public 
under the title of Lives , Adventures , and Histories , by 
anonymous authors , if they be often innocent , yet are 
most commonly insipid; and though in the general it ought 
to be admitted , that characteristical Novels , formed upon 
nature and upon life v\ithout licentiousness, might furnish 
an agreeable and useful entertainment to the mind ; yet 
according as these v^ritings have been , for the most part , 
conducted , it must also be confessed , that they oftener 
tend to dissipation and idleness , than to any good pur- 
pose (i) ». 



LVI. 

LITERARY DISTmCTION THE RESULT 
OF INTRIGUE. 



Is there , or is there not , such a thing as intrinsic merit 
in literary composition ? Or does Fame depend almost en- 
tirely on intrigue and management ? 

The answ^er seems to be , that Fame generally depends 
on the latter : but that the existence of the first is 
independent of Fame. — Without the encouragement of 
Fame , however , Merit very often remains undeveloped. 
Exercise and labour must be added ; or it is stifled in the 
birth. 

At present all literary criticism in Great Britain is re- 

(i) Blair's Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles-Lettres , vol. ui. 



188 THE A.WTI-CRITIC 

duced lo a mecliaiiical system ; and every thing is conduc- 
ted according to the interests of Factions , Pohtical , Reli- 
gions , and National. 



LVIL 

PROSE FICTIONS CLASSED ; WITH 
THEIR USES. 



There are a class of Romances , which rest their pre- 
tensions to interest on the same sources as those which 
give a charm to poetry : on those incidents , which are 
removed from ordinary life; on force of sentiment; energy 
of description ; and depth of colouring : on those incidents 
upon which a poetical fancy dwells with delight : on 
persons , whose characters are cast in a mould above the 
common; and who have to struggle through life with gigantic 
calamities and unattainable ambitions. 

As the tastes of mankind are various ; so are the pur- 
poses for which they take up books of amusement. There 
are times when we desire to ijave only the surface of our 
lightest thoughts gently exercised : there also are times 
when we would have even the depths of our hearts stirred 
to the foundation. There are seasons when weak impulses 
fall upon us like feathers unfelt and unperceived. — When 
some great grief has taken possession of our bosoms ; when 
some overwhelming idea sits brooding , and refuses to be 
removed ; then comes the magic wand of Imagination ; then 
come the ardciUia verba ^ to stir up the incumbent Power; 
and frighten her from the abode she has so tyrannically 



PROSE FICTIOIVS CLASSED. 189 

usurped. As she moves sullenly off, a new train of Ideas 
rush into their place; and the whole frame feels the ani- 
mation of its new visitants. 

Thus it is that a Tale written in a strain of visionary- 
Invention is often a medicine to a diseased mind. The flat 
realities of life sometimes slacken the spring , till it becomes 
totally impotent. The age , in which we live , satiates 
by mere familiarity. If it be an age in itself tame and 
monotonous , how much is the effect increased ? 

With what is called polish , comes sameness and want 
of force. The manners of two centuries back were in this 
respect totally different. They had their evils ; but they 
were full of hope , and adventure , and enjoyment. The 
feudal manners must be admitted to have been full of va- 
riety and incident ; and to have been peculiarly adapted to 
a vigorous talent, a vigorous temper; and vigorous frame. 

Whether the gay son of an ancient nobleman was worse 
employed in nightly depredations on the deer of his neigh- 
bour's Park , or the Dandy who lounges in Bond - Street 
or at Brooks's, till the still of midnght comes, when he 
may carry off his neiohbour's wife ; may be a question 
of morals left to be discussed by others ! 

But there is this advantage at least in the former, that 
it is a better subject for description : that the very novelty 
prevents its palling upon the senses , like the other ; and 
that the bold perils , the hair-headth scapes , call forth a 
sympathy allied to virtue. 

It is true that a set of incidents whose main recommen- 
dation is novelty , and which evaporate in a momentary 
exercise of the fancy, are too transient iu their effects, to 
be of much value. 

But an author, practiced, for a life of nearly sixty years, 
in literary composition , can scarcely fail to make such 
incidents the channels of a thousand thoughts and senti-- 



190 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

ments , which have been long revolving in his mind ; of 
deeply-digested inferences; of axioms v.orked into form and 
language : of imagery hitherto floating in the mind for 
want of a place to rest upon. 

The mere invention of a succession of incidents seems 
to be a very common faculty , as is sufficiently proved 
by the abundant trash of a circulating library. But in 
these not a single sentence detached from the story is of 
the smallest value. It is in the writings of persons of ge- 
nius long exercised in authorship , that we must look for 
the sterling ore , losing little of its worth when decom- 
posed and detached. 

If the whole of human life were to be passed in the 
fever of society , or the practical cunning of business , it 
might be questioned whether the productions, which mainly 
exercise the more abstract qualities of the mind , had not 
a tendency to inflame susceptibilities , wnich had better 
be extinguised. But it is not so : unbroken solitude is the 
fate of many : and solitude must sometimes huppen to all. 
Then it is that we require the consolation of Books : the 
weary hours of vacancy require to be peopled by the 
images of the mind. 

There is no fear that the duly qualified competitors for 
the honour of this occupation will overflovr. No single 
genius, however inexhaustible, is sufficient for this purpose. 

We know in Painting the value of au Imagination, wliich 
deals in new combinations : we acknowlege it by the glow 
of the eye ; and the sensation it conveys thro' the frame. 
A similar effect is still more strongly produced by a new 
literary Fiction, issuing from a vigorous and exercised pen. 



i 



INSCRIPTIONS 191 



LVIII. 

EPITAPH , IN THE CHURCH OF WOOTTON , 

IN RENT. 



Sacred to the Memory of 
Jemima, relict of Edward BrydgeS 
OfWootton Courts Esq."" 
Whom she survwed nine and twenty years , 
And dying December 1 4-^^ ^ ^ ^ 9 1 aged 8 1 , 
VTas buried in the Family Vault in this Cliurch. 
She was of illustrious Birth , 
Being youngest Daughter , and Coheiress . 
Of William Egerton L. L. D. Prebendary of Canterbury^ 
Rector of Penshursi^ and Chancellor of Hereford , 
Who <was one of the sons of 
The Honourable Thomas Egerton ofTatton Park in Cheshire^ 
A younger son of John 2A Earl of Bridgewater , 
By Lady Elisabeth Cavendish, Daughter of 
William Duke of Newcastle. 
An Example of conjugal fidelity ^ 
And domestic virtues ^ 
She passed the most important portion 
Of her life 
In the adjoining Mansion ; 
Where the elegance of her manners , 
The attractions of her Person , 
And the Kindness of her Conduct^ 
Secured her the respect of the High , 



192 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

And the veneration of the Poor. 

Of strong talents., and cultivated mind ^ 

She lived and died in the mingled awe., 

And Con fort of the Christian Faith. 

If age at length enfeebled her frame , 

The cares of a numerous Family 

Struggling with the storms of the world , 

Neither extinguished her Cheerfulness , 

IS or her love of society. 

Keenly alive to praise., 

She repaid attentions with the warmest gratitude., 

And sunk into the grave surrounded 

By those , whose respect and kindness 

Wer^e most delighful to her. 



Sacred also to the 3Iemory of 

Edward Ttmewell Brydges of Wootton Court , A. M, 

Also Hector and Pat/^on of Otterden , 

And of this Paj^ish ; ( Eldest son the said Jemima 

By the said Edward ), 

TVho died at this seat., 

Oct. 17. 1807, aged 58. 

He died respected by his neighbours , 

And beloved and deeply lamented 

By his Parishioners* 

With Feelings too acute 

For the common concerns of Life , 

He possessed a Philanthropy , 

Which glowed with delight at 

All the refined pleasures of Society. 

A mild eloquence , 

Combined 'with a melodious voice.. 

Gave a charm to his Oratory 



INSCRIPTIONS. 193 

Which could rarclj he excelled ; 

And numerous were the F/iends 

Whom_ the attractions of his manners , 

And the suavity of his Di^positioji 

Procured and rivetied' 



The Cares oj Life , and 

The protracted Litigation of his Claim 

To the ancient Barony of Chandos , 

TVhich wasted so many years 

Of his existence , 

Vf^ere at length 

Too much 

For a delicate Constitution ; 

And he sank into the grave 

Before his Mother , 

After a severe Illness of four years , 

Which he bore 

With the most patient fortitude. 



He left no surviving Issue 

By his Wife Caroline , 

Daughter of Richard Fairfield , Esq.'' 

Of Streatham in Su?'ry , 
Who Joins his two surviving Brothers 
Sir Egerton Brydges K, J. 

And 
J. W. H. Brydges Esq."^ 
In erecting this Monument, 



25 



194 THE ANTI-CRITIC 



LVIIL 
CEISTOTAPH. 

( Intended for a Tablet in TVootton Church. ) 



Li memory of 
John Brydges of TVootton Court 
In the county of Kent , 
Esquire ; 
And of Gray s Inn^ Barrister at haw. 
Who died in the month of July 
1712 , 
At the early age of 3 1 years , 
And 9 months : 
And lies buried in the 
Parish Church of St. Alphage 
In Canterbury, 
He was taken off 
By a rapid fever , in the midst 
Of high hopes , and ardent endeavours 
To restore , 
By talent and labour 
In the exercise of an 
Honourable Profession , 
The 'Waning branch of 

His ancient Family 

To its pristine lustre. 

He was born in 

Oct. 1680; 



INSCRIPTIONS. 195 

And after a liberal education 

At Oxford^ 
Though inheriting a competent 

Landed patrimony , 

Applied himself to the study 

Of the Lavvs of his Country , 

As a path of just advancement 

And solid distinction. 

But the prospects of Man are vain; 

And the fire cf his expectations 

Was the flame in which he died ! 

He left three infant children^ 

A daughter Deborah; 

A son John , aged two years ; 

And a second^, son Edward , 

Aged six months; 

( Yet insensible of their loss ) , 

By his wife Jane , 

Only surviving daughter and heir 

Of Edward Gibbon , Esq.^ 

Of Westcliffe , near Dover , 

By Martha, daughter of 

Sir John Roberts , of Bekesborne , K,^ 

Who survived him till 

1738; 

And lies buried in the 

Same Church; 

Together with 

Her grandfather Sir John Roberts , 

Who died in i658 ; 

And her grandmother Dame Jane Roberts , 

Who was daughter of 

Simon Bunce of Throwleigh , 



^ 



196 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

By a daughter of 
Arthur Barhain , Esq.^ 
Son of Sir Nicolas Barham , 
Serjeant at haw in the reign of 
Queen Elisabeth. 



In Memory also 
Of the aboi^e-named 
Jane Brydges , Widow , 
Daughter of Edward Gibbon , Esq."^ 
VFJio \vas eldest son of Thomas Gibbon 
Of Westcliffe Esq J by his second wife Alice Tayla, 
Sister of the half-blood to Jane , 
Wife of Sir John Maynard , 
One of the most eminent Lawyers of his age ^ 
In right of which alliance 
The said Jane Brydges derii'ed 
A valuable landed property 
From the will of the said Dame Jane Maynard. 
Which Jane Brydges also 
By her paternal aunt., Anne wfe 
Of John Coppin of Woo! ton , Esq.^ 
( Whose only son John Coppin 
Died vi^ilhout issue in i yoS ) , 
Finally brought that Seat and 
Estate to her husband , and 
His posterity. 



In grateful recollection 

Of these Benefits 

Still enjoyed ; 



INSCRIPTIONS. 197 

And as a record of this line 

Of inheritance , 

This Tablet is thus 

Inscribed. 



LIX. 
CENOTAPH 

FOR 

THE CHURCH OF ICKHABI, IN KENT. 



Sacred to the momory 

Of 

Thomas Barrett of Lee in the 

Parish of Ickham , in the 

County of Kent ^ Esq.^ 

VFho died in the month of ^January , 

i8o3, aged 69, 

He WIS only son of Thomas Barrett , 

Of the same place , Ksq.^ 

Who died in 1708 ; 

By his fourth wife , the daughter and heir 

Of Humphry Pudnor , Esq J by 

A daughter and coheir of Si'- IVdliam Willys , Bar» 

His great grandfather was 

Sir Paul Barrett^ of the Same Place , i^.' 

Serjeant at Law ; Recorder of Canterbury^ 

And Member of PariiauK^nt for New Romney , 

In the reign of' K. Charles II, 



198 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

The said Thomas Barrett died unuiarried. 
His moral character was 

Amiable and correct. 

He was distinguished by 

A cultivated understanding , 

An exquisite taste , and 

The highest polish of manners. 

He adorned his seat at Lee at a vast expence^ 

To the advancement of the Arts , 

And the admiration of all , who are 

Skilled ill Architecture , or Fainting, 

He sat a short time in Parliament 

For Dover : 

But was better fitted for the 

Quiet splendor of private life , 

Than the turmoils of public business 

He left his estate and his uame 

To his great nephew^ 

Thomas , grandson of his only sister , 

Eldest son of Sir Egerton Brydges , Bar,"^ 

Now a Captain in his 

Majestys Grenadier Beg.^ 

Of Guards. 



INSCRIPTIONS. 199 



LX. 

CENOTAPH 

FOR. 

9 
THE CHURCH OF MONk's HORTON IN KENT» 



This Tablet is inscidbed 

As a memorial of 

The Rev. William Robinson , A, ISl. 

Rector of Bwfield in Berkshire , 

And formerly also Hector of Denton , 

In the county of Kent ; 

Who died in Dec. i8o3 , aged ( circ.) 76. 

He -was one of the younger 

Sons of Matthew Robinson of this 

Parish of Horton , Esc/ J by Elisabeth 

Heiress oj the Family of Morris , 

Whose mother remarried the learned Conyers Middleton^ DD. 

And the said Matthew was 

Grandson of Sir Eeonard Robinson , Kj^ 

One of the sons of Thomas Robinson , 

Of Rokeby , in the County of York , Esq J 

By his marriage., in (1621) with 

Frances daughter of Eeonard Smelt of 

Kirby-Fletham , Esq.'^ by . . . Allanson, 

The said William Robinson 

Was a good and ripe scholar; 

A man of highly cultivated taste ; and 

Superior native talent. 



200 THE A.NTI-CRITIC 

He was the friend and companion 

Of men of genius ; 

And especially intimate with the poet Gray- 

He had two sisters distinguished for literature , 

Of whom Elizabeth , widow of Edward Montagu , Esq' 

Is celebrated for her Essay on Shakespeare-, 

And her Epistolary genius. 



In Noi^. 1800, by the death of his 

Elder brother , Matthew , 2..d Lord Roreby 

He succeeded by dei^ise to a portion 

Of his estates in Kent^ Yorkshire ; 

Durham , and Cambridgeshire^ 
And to a large personal property. 



He left one son, 

And two daughters , his 

Survivors, 



LXI. 

INSCRIPTION 

FOR 

THE CHURCH OF WESTCLIFFE , HEAR DOVER, 



Sacred to the Memory 

Of Thomas Gibbon of Westcliffe , EsqS 

Who died 1674 ; 



ii\scrviPTio?fS. 201 

y4ged 80 years and upwards. 

By his first wife Dorolhy Best , 

Daughter of Thomas Best af Allingtoii^ Esq.^ 

He left issue his eldest sou^ 

Thomas Gibbon of Westcliffe , Esq."" 

Who married^ Mary sister of Sir William Rooke, 

Of Monk's Horton ^ K.^ and other issue. 

By his second wife , Alice Taylor , 

He lejt issue Edward Gibbon^ Esq J 

Who married Martha daughter of Sir John Roberts^ iC- 

And also 

Matthew Gibbon of London, Marchant , who 

Had issue Edward, born in i666, after wands 

A Commissioner^ of the Customs in the Reign of Q. Anne; 

Thomas , Dean of Carlisle ; 

And Elizabeth , wife of Sir Whitmore Acton , Bar.^ 

( Besides other issue* ) 

The said Thomas Gibbon , the elder , 

Was Lord of the Manor, and Patron of the Advowson . 

Of Kingston , near Canterbury , 

Which he settled on his second son, 

Richard Gibbon, M. D. 



LXII. 

INSCIPTION 

FOR 

THE SAME CHURCH. 



In rneuiory of 
Edwakd Gibbon Esquire 



202 THE A.NTI-CRTTIG 

Who by his Jlrst wijh Martha , 

Daughter of Sir John Boberts ^ K.^ 

Left issue Jane , his onlj' daughter and heir 

He married secondly 

His cousin Elizabeth Gibbon, 

Daughter of Richard Gibbon , 

By whom he had an only son , 

TVho died in his youth. 



In nieniojy also of 

The said Elizabeth Gibbon 

VFho surnving the said Edward , 

Remarried M. Philip Yorke , 

By whom she had Philip Yorke , born 1 690 , 

Afterwards Earl of Hardwicke , 

And Lord High Chancellor of England. 



LXIII. 

INSCRIPTION 

FOR 

THE CHURCH OF ICKHAM , m KENT. 



In memory of 

Dame Sarah, widow of Sir Paul Barrett , 7v/ 

She was daughter of 

Sir George Ent , X'.' M, D. 

President of the College of Physicians , 

And one of the most learned and eminent Physicians 

Of the reign of K, Charles II. 



INSCRIPTIONS. 203 

Who died i3 Oct. 1689, aged 86. 

The said Sarah was first married to 

Francis Mead , son and heir apparent of 

Sir Richard Head., Bar.^ 

( By whom she had issue Sir Francis Head , zd Bar. ' ) 

Survi^^ing her second Husband many years , 

The said Dame Sarah died at her seat in this parish ; 

And was buried in the family vault 

In this Church. 



LXIV. 
INSCRIPTION 

FOR 

THE CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF CHESTER. 

Sacred to his glorious memory 

Of Sir William Mainwaring , K.^ 

Who died in the cause of Loyalty, 

Gallantly fighting for his Sovereign K. Charles I^ 

On the walls of Chester i643. 

He was son of Edmund Mainwaring , LL, D. 

A younger son of Sir Randal Mainwaring ofPever., 

in Cheshire , 

One of the families of the most indubitable antiquity 

Of the very ancient Gentry of this County. 

He fell in the prime of youth; 

In the midst of love., respect., and admiration., 

The result of every personal accomplishment , 

And virtue. 



204 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

He married HesiJwr daughter and Heir of 

Christopher Wase^ Esq.^ of Upper Holloway^ in Middlesex; 

Bjr whom he left two daughters , 

His coheirs ; 
Hesther , afterwards manned to 
Sir John Busby, of Addingtoji , Co. Bucks , X.' 
And . . . married to Sir Thomas Howe, K^ 



LXV. 

INSCRIPTION 

FOR 

THE CHURCH OF RIDGE, m HERTFORDSHIRE. 



This Tablet 
Records the memory of 
Hesther, wife of Sir Henry Pope Blount, 

Of Tittenhanger ^ K.^ 

Widow of Sir William Mainwaring^ K.^ 

And daughter and heir of Christopher Wase, Esg.^ 

By her first husband she had two daughters 

Lady Busby , and Lady Howe. 

By her second husband Sir Henry Pope Blount , 

Who has rendered his name famous by his 

Ingenious i'oyage to the Levant , 

She had issue Sir Thomas Pope Blount ofTittenhanger^ Bar.^ 

Celebrated for his learned Writings ; 

Also Charles Blount , Esq.^^ etc. 



mscRiPTio]>fS. 205 



LXVI. 

INSCRIPTION 

FOR 

THE CHURCH OF GREAT GADDESDEN, 
m HERTFORSDHIRE. 

^-H^-^--^ 

Sacred to the memory of 
Hesther , widow of the Honourable Thomas Egerton, 
OfTatton Park ^ in Cheshire ^ 
Daughter of Sir John Bushy of Addingtoa Co. Bucks , K/ 
By Hesther daughter and coheir of 
Sir William Mainwaring^ X.' 
She died i y24 ?" 

Having survived., for nearly forty years ^ 
Her Husband., who was taken off in the flower cf his youth., 
And lies buried here , 
In the Family Vault of the Eaj^ls of Bridgewater. 
She left her surviving son , William Egerton , LLD. 
Rector of Penshurst (i), in Kent., etc. 
Her Executor (2). 

[i] He lies buried in the church of Penshurst, 1787, which 
parish his daughter Jemima was born in Sept. 1728. His widow , 
Anne daughter of Sir Francis Head, Bar.* was also buried there , 
1778. 

[2] The dates oj these Inscriptions hauing been filled up by me- 
mory , the uintiquary is requested to make allowances for any tri- 
fling inaccuracy. 

Geneva, Jan. 17. 1822. 



206 THE AT^TI-CRTTIC 



ON THE MEMOIRS OF EDWARD GIBBOIN^ 
THE HISTORIAN. WRITTEN BY HIMSELF, 



The Inscriptions , -which, have preceeded the present A.r- 
ticle , suggest to me the opportunity of saying something 
on the commencement of M/ Gibbon's Memoirs. The His- 
torian has made some apology for that interest regarding 
the history' of our ancestors , which seems implanted in 
our nature. I remember that Bishop JVatson , a severe , 
dry, analytical reasoner, without a spark of fancy or sen- 
timent , begins his Own Life with a similar apology. We 
have the same feelings expressed in the writings of Great 
Men from the earliest ages. 

This is also fully admitted by one, whose own illus- 
trious merits rendered it totally unnecessary to his impor- 
tance to resort to reflected and (what are called) adven- 
titious honours. The immortal Sully thus speaks of hi^ 

descent , and alliances. 

« Comme c'est « ( says he , ) « I'histoire de ma vie jointe 

a celle du Prince que j'ai servi , qui va faire le sujet de 

ces Memoires , je dois donner un eclaircissement sur ma 

famille et sur ma personne. En satisfaisant la curiosite du 

public a cet egard , je le fais sans affectation et sans va- 

nite , et que je donne a la seule necessite de dire la verite 

tout ce qu'on pourra rencontrer d'avantageux pour moi ici 

et dans toute la suite de ces Memoires. 

« Maximilien est mon nom de Bapteme, et Bethuhe est 

celui de ma famille. Elle tire son origine par la maison de 

Coucy , de I'ancienne maison d'Autriche , etc. » 



GIBBON. 207 

« La malson de Bethune qui a donne son nom a ime 
ville de Flandre , » etc. , « furent declares protecteurs de 
|a province tl'Artois , etc.. » 

« Elle s'allia avec presque toutes les maisons souveraines 
de I'Europe , etc. (i). 

« Quand on a de pareilles exemples domestiques , on ne 
sauroit les rappeler trop souvent pour s'animer a les suivre. 
Heureux ! si pendant toute ma vie j'ai pu me comporter 
de maniere que tant d'liommes illustres ne dedaignent pas 
de me reconnoitre, et que je ne rougisse pas moi - meme 
d'en etre descendu , » etc. 

« Mais je dois aussi avouer que la Branche dont je suis 
sorli avoit alors beaucoup perdu de sa premiere splendeur. 
Cette Branche est issue d'un simple cadet , et le moins 
riche de tous ceux qui ont porte ce nom. La Branche 
ainee etant tombee trois fois en querouille, tous les grands 
biens qu'elle possedoit dans differens endroits de I'Europe , 
ne passerent point aux coUateraux, mais furent portes par 
les filles dans les maisons Royales ou elles entrerent. Mes 
ancetres particuliers ne laisserent pas, en se mariant avanta- 
geusement , de redonner a leur Branche ce que leur man- 
quoit pour soutenir dignement son nom : mais toutes ces 
richesses furent presqu'entierement dissipees par le mauvais 
menage et la prodigalite de mon grand-pere , qui ne laissa 
a son fils qui est mon pere que le bien d'ANiiE de Melun 
sa femme , qu'il ne pouvoit pas lui oter , » etc. (2). 

[j] «Par les maisons de Cliatillon, etc., elle comptoit, dit Du Chesne, 
plus de dix Princes du Sang Royal de France, et tous les Souve- 
rans de I'Europe. 

[2] See Hlstoire Genealogique des Maisons de Chatillon , M'ont^ 
morency et Lasal^ F~ergj; Guignes, Ardres ^ Gand et Coucj-, Dreux, 
Bar le-Duc , Luxembourg et Limbourg , du Plessis de Richelieu^ de 
Broyes et Chasteau - J^illain , de Chastenieres et de Bethune , par 
And. Du Chesne, Pavis 1629-1639, 7 ^ol. foL 



208 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Unquestionably tlie descent of Sully was \'ery different 
from that of Watson or Gibbon. But it is worth observing , 
what is the effect of great personal superioritj and merit! 
Gibbon has given a lustre and extension to his name ir. 
Europe , which>* centuries of the highest rank and greatest 
possessions cannot give. Great Nobles, inheriting splendid 
honours from a long succession of ancestors, may command 
respect and veneration in their own country : but a 
Foreign People will feel no interest about them ; nor per- 
haps even recognize their existence. 

It may be asked, what there was in Gibbon, of such 
extraordinary preeminence as to command this effect ? It 
cannot be ascribed to superiority of high and positive ge- 
nius ^ for this quality cannot be justly said to have been 
his characteristic. It may rather be attributed to complex 
causes. We may therefore notice, 

I. The magnitude and universal interest of the subject 
of his Great His to? j of the Decline and Fall of the Roman 
Empire. 

1. The vast extent of research and erudition, with which 
he has treated his subject. 

3. The method and clearness of his arrangement ; and 
the digested and finished manner, in which he has deoom- 
posed , and rebuilt the whole. 

4. A spirit of elegant and philosophical criticism , vdth 
which he examines , selects , and judges. 

5. A freedom of opinion ; and the interest , created by 
the novelty of disputing commonly received principles and 
facts. 

6. A style, which, if neither pure, nor splendid, is yet 
glittering and full of point. 

7. A talent and skill of compression, and due and pro- 
portionate distribution, which cannot be too much praised. 

8. An uniformity of contexture; and total freedom from 



GIBBO^f. 209 

all patches and borrowings , and insertion of unassorted 
materials , from wliicli scarcely any other long History is 
free. 

These characteristics might be muUiplled by others of a 
similar kind. But these alone may probably be deemed 
sufficient for the effect , for which they arc stated to 
account. 

If we reflect, how comparatively narrow are the sub- 
jects embraced by most other celebrated Historians , the 
superiority of Gibbon in this respect alone gives him the 
most decided preeminence. Can we wonder then at the 
distinction he enjoys, when all the other attractions I have 
named , are added to it ? The learned and the curious of 
all Nations must feel an equal interest in this Work. And 
as it always contains an economy of thought and matter, 
and a calmness and good humour of discussion , which 
neither wastes the spirits _, nor harasses the attention , it 
conciliates all humours and prejudices ; and seems made for 
the Universe ; and not for one time or country. But an 
Hypercritic might yet find many serious , and perhaps pre- 
dominant defects in this History. 

It has rather the distinction of an immense edifice striking 
from the vast number of its parts , or apartments , all of 
one plan and one measure , than from the grandeur and 
variety of its design and execution. It betrays more of 
polish and artifice, than of native force. 

The impressions of the Historian were clear, and reten- 
tive ; and he has his recollections constantly alive : but he 
wants original and intrinsic energies : all with him seems 
to be the acquisition of study. There is in him therefore 
nothing which astonishes by its profundity, or its acuteness ; 
nothing which bears aways by bursts of overwhelming elo- 
quence. 

It is perhaps the author's sedateness of temper ; iiis ba« 



210 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

lancing , considering mind , wLicli lias secured the due 
apportionment of his materials , and the taste of his se- 
leclions : but we meet \\ ilh no discoveries ; we are cheered 
by no flashes of light : we are wearied with monotony ; 
and persevere , rather as a task , than as a pleasure. It 
requires the Historian's phlegm , to read him with due 
interest ; and the Historian's practised memory , and am- 
bition of recondite , knowlege to give an impulse which will 
not flag in the labour of the perusal. 

His love of precision; his critical cariosity; his easy and 
unruffled apprehension; his even-paced exertion of strength, 
carried him on from day to day , and year to year , with 
an unebbing hope that he should arrive at the distant 
goal : like the sand of the lour - glass , all went quietly 
through the sieve of his mind ; broke itself , in due and 
unconflicting order , into atoms ; and was ready to be 
replaced and amalgamated into one even texture, in which 
there were no masses; nor any ill-sorted combinations. 

Hume is equally free from prolixity and inequality ; and 
Hume's style is far more easy and transparent : but Hume 
was not equally encumbered with research : the period of 
his Work was comparatively short and circumscribed ; and 
the materials , which he used , lay upon the surface. He 
did not trouble himself with the digest of voluminous li- 
braries of rare^ dry, difficult, and barbarous learning : but 
he seised on facts which were easily within every one's 
reach ; and throwing on them the sunshine of a lucid , 
acute , rapid , and highly-cultivated mind , depended on the 
charm of the manner , and the adornment of the genial 
beams of intellect whic!), a genius already stored with 
extraneous riches threw upon it ! 

Robertson was a philosopher, and an antiquary, as well 
as an accomplished and sagacious Historian. His investiga- 
tions were profound , laborious , and enlightened ; and he 



GIBBON. 211 

appears to have searclied for trulli with an intfgrity, -vvhick 
will ensure the duration of his Works. The subjects he 
chose were highly important : but still they cannot be put 
in competition with the universality of interest inherent in 
the subject of Gibbon. The erudition they required , is 
immeasurably less extensive; and the concentration of mind , 
which they permitted , rendered depth and force more 
attainable. 

But there is something of monotony also attributable to 
r.obertson : his style is artificial ; and approaches to the 
dry , and hard : he has no eloquence ; and , I think , no 
fancy. 

If we were to dra^v the possible, rather than what the 
world has hitherto seen , we might invent an Historian 
•with the imagination of a Poet , yet with the fidelity of 
an Annalist ! Imagination might light him to the most 
secret recesses of the temple of Truth ; aud discover to him 
what profound learning and laborious enquiry never yet 
reached ! But such prodigies we have not hitherto been 
allowed to witness. The Imagination is too apt to draw 
what it wishes : — > not what has actually been ! 

If then in fact Gibbon has produced a work , which 
altogether is not likely to be paralleled , what is the effect 
of the lustre , which it gives to his name ? Can it throw 
back a splendor upon his ancestors ? Can it confer any 
honour on the collaterals of his blood ? It will be difficult 
to persuade the Public, in these days of what is called glo- 
rious emancipation from prejudice, that the character^ rank, 
habits , and adventitious circumstances of a man's family , 
have any concern with his own personal intellectual gifts , 
acquirements , and productions. But if Addison be right , 
we never read a Book with interest , without wishing to 
know the history of its Author. 

M.^ Gibbon has himself attempted to give a narration of 



2i2 TIIK A?fTJ- CRITIC 

liis Descent : and it is a little singular, that lie lias totally 
mistaken tlie upper part of it, as far a regards the Branch, 
whence he sprung. There is in the world so much stupid 
scepticism about pedigrees , ( caused , no doubt , by the 
charlatanism , which is often displayed on this subject ) , 
that many will receive with hesitation from me this cor- 
rection of the Historian himself. But wdiat I have to say 
is no more a matter of doubt , than who was the His- 
torian's /rt^/ze/? It regards the hlrth of his great-grand- 
father Matthew; and the identity of Matthew s father and 
mother! That this Matthew was not of the Rolvenden Branch; 
but a younger son of Thomas Gibbon ^ Esq.'^ of Westcliffe , by 
Alice Taylor , his second wife , the deeds , wills , letters , 
and property in my possession prove beyond all possibi- 
lity of controversy. I corresponded with M.^ Gibbon on the 
subject in the autumn before his death, (1793); and con- 
vinced him of his error : but it was too late to give him 
the opportunity of setting this part of his Memoir right. 

M.^' Gibbon was the seventh in descent from Thomas 
Gibbon , who bought the Lordship and seat of iVestcliffe ^ 
( a small parish between Dover and Deal ) , from Thomas 
Lord Borough about iSyo. The head Branch of the family 
had been settled for some centuries at Rolvenden in the 
JFeald of Kent , as is recorded by Philipot , on decisive 
authority, in his Villare Caiitianum published about i65o. 
The same antiquary asserts in direct terms that the 
Gibbons of Westcliffe were a Branch of this Family. After 
a great deal of pains , I confess that I have not been able 
to discover when they branched off; nor the mode in which 
they ought to be joined together. But the evidence of a 
celebrated Antiquary and Genealogist , nearly two hundred 
years ago , printed at the time it was written , is surely 
sufficient authority for such a fact. I may add , that the 
materials of the Villare were collected by Philipot's father , 



GIBBOT^. 213 

wlio was an Herald , and Kentish man : and eminent in 
his profession. 

Tiie Branches o£ this House varied the field of their 
Arms. Those of Rohenden bore it hliie : those of Bishops- 
bourne , Westcliffe , etc. , changed it to Sable (i). The 
rank , which a Family holds , may be known from its 
alhances , with a precision that seldom errs. The sphere 
therefore in which the Gibbons of Westcliffe moved , from 
the close of the reign of Q. Elizabeth to the close of that 
of K. Charles II , may be easily and clearly ascertained. It 
cannot be pretended that the rank of a country gentleman 

(i) There is some difficulty as lo tlie Branches, to whom this 
variation was assigned. A patent or Grant exists, assigning it to 
those of Frld m. Bethersden, whence came those of CharUon in 
Bishopsbourne, Those of Jf^estcUffe bore it exactly the same : whence 
it may be inferred , that they were of the Bethersden Branch. Their 
positive usage of this particular variation , from the commencement 
of the reigu of K. Charles I. may be proved by many seals, pain- 
tings , and hatchments , yet existing. And this gives me an oppor- 
tunity of mentioning what is worth the notice of Kentish Genealo- 
gists. The Last f^'isitation of Kent by the Heralds was made by Sir 
'Edward Bysshe in i663. It is a very slight and careless one : and 
this can excite no surprize in those , who consult the character of 
Sir Edward given by Anthony TVood. In the volume , in which 
the pedigrees are entered, a Blank is left for the arms of no incon- 
siderable number of the Families recorded. A few years ago the 
original Note Book of the Clerk , who accompanied Sir Edward 
in this Visita.iion , was recovered from the sale of M.^ Brand's 
Library. Most of these arms are there preserved ; but were after- 
Wards omitted to be copied fair into the Office-Book. A late Herald, 
no incompetent judge on such a subject , and not inclined to the 
side of candour , considered them to be thns so authenticated , that 
he proposed to apj)end them, to the Visitation. But higher authority 
prevailed !! 

Among these arms were recorded those of Gibbon of Westcliffe, 
in the form already mentioned. 



21-4 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

possesses a lustre , which creates a general interest. But it 
has an independence , which keeps off degradation , and 
soothes pride. The evil of a country life is the tendency 
which it has to encourage a torpor of the mental fa- 
culties. The sports of the field are good for the body : 
but , if they are not taken in great moderation , they are 
not good for the mind. I have been accustomed , therefore , 
to search for proofs of a spirit , which carried them beyond 
such a narrow sphere of existence. 

The Bests , of which family was the first wife of Thomas 
Gibbon, ( a marriage, which took place about the middle 
of the reign of K. James I ) were a family of repute. They 
had estates and residences in several parts of the County. 
Their chief seat was Bihroohe (i) , in the parish of Ken- 
nington. They had another seat at St. Lawrence , near 
Canterbury : and they also resided at Allington , adjoining 
to Maidstone : but whether as proprietors , or whether 
they rented the celebrated Castle , ( once the seat of Sir 
Thomas Wyat , the poet ) , of the Astleys of Maidstone , I 
have not discovered. It is true , that they did not move 
quite in the lofty sphere of the Astleys (2) , though they 
seem to have been allied to them. 



(i) I think this property was sold to the Shoriers , of which fa- 
mily was the inolher of the late celebrated , Horace Welpoie , Earl 
of Orford. 

(2) John Astley, Esq.^, of Allington Castle, and of the Palace at 
Maidstone, was Master of the Jewel - Office , lo Q. Elizabeth j and 
his wife , Margaret Grey , was early one of her Maids of Honour. 
Sir John Astley , their son , was Master of the Revels to K. Charles I , 
and died i638. He married Katherine , daughter of Anthony Brydges, 
brother to Edmund 2.d Lord Chandos K. G. Sir Jacob Astley , 
created Lord Astley oj Reading , was his collateral successor. See 
Lord Clarendon s HlsLorj, 

Two of Sir John Astley 's sisters and coheirs married Sir Norton 



GliiEOxY. 215 

By this fust wife M.^ Gibbon had a large family , who 
allied themselves to the neighbouring gentry. His eldest 
son intermarried wilh the family cf Rooke, aunt of Ihe ce- 
lebrated Admiral , Sir George R.ooke : which family were 
also illustrated at this time by the philosophical genius o/ 
Laurence Rooke. of whom there is an eloquent eulogy in 
Bishop SpraCs lUstory of the Royal Society. 

Nor was this little Parish of Westdiffe at this time totally 
obscure in other respects. It contained another seat , called 
Solton , long the residence of the Finets. Here was born 
SIr John Finet (i) , a wit in the Court of K, Charles I. 
and Master of the Ceremonies ; of whom notices occur in 
Weldon, and other memoir-writers ; and whose Philoxenis : 
Observations touching the Reception of Foreign Ambassadors 
in England, i65o (a), in-ii.^ , is yet held in esteem. He 
married a daughter of Lord Wentworth by a daughter of 
Sir Owen Hopton, whose other daughter married William 
Lord Chandos. Not merely close neighbourhood , but the 
common alliance of this family and that of Gibbon to the 
family of Foche of Wootton , united them intimately : and 
they were probably otherwise related in blood. 

Knatchbull : and his brother, M7 Thomas Knatchbull, whose son. 
Sir Norton, was created a Bar.* 1641. The KnalcJiluUs also inter- 
married with the Gibbons. 

(i) He is thus mentioned in the BiograpJiie Uiiwerselle. 

« Finet (Sir John), auteur auglais, issue d'une ancienne famille 
dltalie , naquit en iSyr a Soulton, pres de Douvres. II fut eleve k 
la cour, etc. II fut envoye en France comme charge d'affaires, et fut 
cree Chevalier cette annee, et fit en 1626, maitre des Ceremonies. Ses 
ouvrages sont : I. Fineii Philoxenis , etc. — 16" 56. 8° II. Le com- 
mencement , la duree et la decadence des Etais , etc. ; tj^aduit en 
anglais- du Jrancais de Rend de Lusinge , et imprime en 1604. — . 
Finet mourut en 1641. ( Biog. Univ. v. 14, p. 545. ) 

(2) See Triphook's Catalogue, 1820, N.° 718, 



216 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Mj Gibbon's first wife dying , wlien he was yet young, 
he remarried a lady of the name of Tajlor , whose mother 
was the widow of M/ Selherst of Tenterden , by which 
first husband she had a daughter Jane, a celebrated Beauty. 
Jane Selherst first married Edward Austen (i) of Tenter- 
den , Esq.^% and afterwards that profound lawyer, and 
celebrated Politician , Sir John Maynard , Serjeant at Law, 
and afterwards one of the Commissioners of the Great Seal, 
in the reign of K. William. She died long bfifore her last 
husband without issue ; and settled her property on the 
issue of her two half-sisters , Jane , the wife of..... Codd , 
Esq.^ of Watringbury , whose son died , issueless , during 
his Shrievalty of Kent , 1707 ; and of Alice, wife of Thomas 
Gibbon. In 1709 the only two survivors of her nephews 
and nieces were Philip Gibbon , and his sister Deborah 
Bradford , w idow , who surrendered the property by deed 
to John Brydges , Esq.^ , husband of their niece Jane 
Gibbon (1). 

Mj Gibbon , thus nearly connected by marriage with a 
man who took so active a part in public life as Sir John 
Mafjiard , could scarcely have passed his life in obscu- 
rity : or without an easy access to the company of those , 
who were acting on the great stage of the world. His 
family was numerous ; but his fortune was ample , if I 
may judge from the deeds of purchase , and other instru- 
ments , which have passed through my hands. He lived 
to a great age ; and having maiTied a third time to a 

(i) They were made Baronets in 1660 j and tlie widow of the 
last , was the friend of Cowper ; and gave occasion to his Task. 

(2") This deed thus recites the pedigree : and the will of Dchorah 
Bradford of St. Andrew^ Holborn <, widow, 171 2 j gives many 
legacies to her relations, naming their degree of kindred. She men- 
tions her nephews , Edward and Thomas Giblon , sons oj' her 
hrolher Matthew, etc. 



GIBBON. 2 1 7 

^idow of fortune , gave up the residence at WcstcVffe td 
his eldest son Thomas , who was educated at one of the 
Inns of Court , but who does not seem ever to have 
pursued the Law as a profession. 

This Thomas, the younger , had several children ; but I 
have never heard of any descendants from them j and do 
not doubt that they all soon became extinct. 

The fate of the mansion and estate at WestcViffe , I am 
also unable to explain. Thomas , the younger , ( who was 
eldest of t"ie Brothers), quitted it long before his death j 
and at the decease of the Father, (1674), I have a do- 
cument which proves that Edward and Matthew , sons of 
Alice Taylor , the second wife , each succeeded to a share 
in it. On this subject an anecdote has been handed down 
to me , which not improbably gives the origin of a family, 
who in the last fifty years have made some noise on the 
other side the Atlantic. A M.J Randolph , of a good Kentish 
family (i) ^ ( still existing in that County ) , had married a 
sister of Edward and Matthew Gibbon. When the property 
of the estate became divided, Randolph hired it : but bemg 
a very improvident many he became, after some time, so 
greatly in arrear for rent , that the owners felt themselves 
under the necessity of distraining. This was the occasion 
which caused a Letter from Matthew Gibbon , (the Histo- 
tian's great grandfather ) , still possessed by me. Randolph 
fled to America ; and was ancestor of persons of the name , 
who took an active part in the American Revolution. These, 
I take for granted, are the same who have filled with dis- 
tinction the office of President of the Congress. 

It is probable , that from this time the mansion of 
Westcliffe was deserted ; and gradually dilapidated into a 

[i] Old Recorder Randolph, of this family, was intimate with my 
grandfather. His grandson was late Bishop of Oxford. 



218 THE AISTI-CRITIC 

farm-house. I know not when it was sold; or by whom 
it was purchased. But in the reign of Q. Anne it was 
bought by Admiral Ayhner , (created Lord Ayhner 1718, 
who died 1724). Thirty four years have elapsed, since I 
■visited it. The armorial ensigns of the Gibbons just shewed 
themselves in faded fragments round the cornice of one of 
the rooms with the date of ( I think ) 1627 (i). It stands 
in an open country, high upon the white cliffs, that over- 
look the opposite coast of France, from Calais towards the 
North. The distance from Dover-Castle is , ( if I recollect ) 
not more than three miles. It is a district a present very 
thinly inhabited by gentry ; and bleak and unpicturesque 
from the deficiency of trees and wood. 

But I trod over it with a fulness of mind , and depth of 
emotion , which I cannot controul. I was busy in the com- 
pany of my ancestors ; and peopled it with a thousand of 
the dead. 

I know not when Edward Gibbon , the father of my 
grandmother, died. In 1690, his widow had already a son 
born by her second husband, BIj Yoj^le of Dover \ and 
this son was the celebrated Philip , afterwards Lord High 
Chancellor of England , and Earl of Hardwicke. She lived , 
I believe , long enough to see him rise to the rank of 
Attorney-General. She was a cousin of her first husband , 
being the daughter and heir of a M.*" Richard Gibbon ^ of 
Dover , whose exact deg-^ee of relationship to those of 
WestcUffe , I have never been able to ascertain. 

Edward Gibbon's first wife was Martha daughter of Sir 



[i] It seems to have been the fate of this property to have been 
connected -v^itli men distinguished in the world. When M.*" Pitt 
was Miuisler , he hired the farm of 400 acres, of which the culti- 
vation formed one of his amusements during the short intervals of 



GIBBOPf. 219 

John Roberts, of Bekesborne , near Canterbury, K-', who 
had another daughter married to Thomas Tohon , Esq J , 
also of Bekesborne. I mention this last marriage , because 
it was io this family that the celebrated D/ White Kennet, 
a native of Dover , afterwards Bishop of Peterbojough (i) , 
was in his early life a Tutor. It was about the reign of K. 
James II, that the male line of the Gibbons ceased to sur- 
vive In Kent. Thomas and Edward were now dead ; D.^ 
Richard , the physician , had died many years before his 
father , at an early age ; Philip had become a Jesuit at St. 
Omer's ( as I have heard ) ; JMatthew lived ; but he lived 
in London, engaged in a lucrative commerce. I have not 
learned the name of liis wife Hesther : but she had pro- 
bably no connection with Kent. The principal ties with the 
County having ceased ; ( for I do not doubt that the estate 
of Westclljfe , being now broke into parcels became incon- 
venient to be retained , and was sold before Edward's 
death.), Matthew probably withdrew every year more and 
more his communications and his affections from Rent. He 
left his niece to the care of the Coppins (2) , of Wootton , 

[i] Bishop Kennet Avas a man of an ardent inind, who made li- 
terary lahour lii^s d.-liyht. His Historical Chronicle contains innume- 
rable useful , though minute , historical and literary notices. His 
History oj' England, ■which is composed of a selection of Histories 
of particular Reigns by different eminent Authors , with his own 
Notes , and the chasms filled up, and the continuation given by 
Himself, is a valuable and intelligent Collection. But lie was far 
from being a mere compiler; his own original compositions are full 
of strength and knowlege. He was a deep antiquary; a learned and 
acute Divine ; and a liberal , enlarged , and enlightened Politician. 

His brother, Basil Kennet, was an eminent Greek scholar, and 
compiled flie Li^es of the Grecian Poets. 

(2) She was doubly connected with the Coppins. The last son was 
not only the sou of an elder half-sister of her Father; but married 
her mother's sister, Mary, daughter of Sir John Roberts. 



220 THE ANTI-GRITIC 

who had adopted her ; and who having no children of 
their own, were likely to take ample care of her. Matthew 
Gibbon died about 1707; and his widow Hesther remar- 
ried Richard Acton of London, Banker, ( or Goldsmith, 
as that business was then called ) , 3d son of Sir AValter 
Acton, of Aldenham , in Shropshire, Ear.'; about the 
same time also, (whether before, or after), her daughter 
Elizabeth Gibbon married Sir Whitmore Acton, Bar.% the 
head of that ancient family; who died 1732, and was 
mother of Sir Richard, born Jan. i. 1772, -s^ho died 
without issue, Nov. 20. 1791 , set. 80 (i). 

Edward Gibbon , eldest son of Matthew and Hesther , 
Lorn 1666 , also married Elizabeth the daughter of 
Richard Ac'on ; and by him had issue Edward born 1707, 
the father of the Historian. 

This first Edward became a rich Merchant; and is me- 

The family possessed the seat of Wonlton for a Century. In the 
re'gn of Qu. Eliz. it was the seat of Leonard aud Thomas Digges » 
father and grandfather of Sir Dudley Digges. 

(i) He married Lad}'^ Anne Grey, daughter of Henry, 3d Earl 
of Stamford. 

He was succeeded in the Baronetage hy his next collateral heir 
male , Sir John Francis Edward Acton , born 1736-, great great- 
grandson of Capt. Walter Acton , next elder brother of Richard , 
the goldsmith; which Walter had a son Walter, who died 1718 , 
leaving ten sons. Edward , eldest son , born 1679 ' ^^^ father of 
Edward Acton, horn 1709, who went to reside at Besancon in the 
Proi'ince of Burgundy , in France ; and marrying a French Lady' 
left three sons, and one daughter. 

Sir John Francis Edward Acton , eldest son , is known to all 
Europe in the office of Prime Minister to the King of Naples , in 
which kingdom he possessed the full power and favour for so many 
years. He died at Palermo, 12 Aug. i8ii. His eldest son. Sir 
Ferdinaud-Richard-Edward Acton, is the present Bar.t horn 26 July 
?8oi. 



GIBBON. 22 1 

morable as one of the Southsea Directors ; a bubble , in 
whicli his concern T^as the wreck of his fortune. He 
however, commenced afresh, (as his grandson says); and 
left an ample inheritance to his son. He died, Dec. 1736 (i). 



[i] His first cousin , M.rs Brydges, survived him two years : but 
I believe, that all intimacy between them, if it ever existed, had 
long ceased. I find no letters of correspondence ; or community of 
interests. I have two Letters of Matthew, the father , with regard 
to the distress at TP^estcliffe ; and also a note in the hand- writing 
of M}' John Coppin. It is not improbable, that some family diffe- 
rence had alienated them from eacii other : and the preference given 
by Philip Gibbon and Dorothy Bradford to their niece Jane (Brydges) 
daughter of Edward G. over their nephew Edward G. son of Matthew, 
in surrendering to her, (or rather her husband ) , theRomney Marsh 
property devolved from Lady Maynard ( a property, of which the 
inheritance has devolved on the present writer , and is now perhaps 
(or lately was) worth thirty thousand pounds, — a preference so 
valuable, might possibly breed dissatisfaction, that increased, till all 
acquaintance ended. I am sure , that all intercourse did end; for 
my uncle and father were both old enough to have been well ac- 
quainted witli the South-sea Director, Edward, who was so near in 
blood, as first-cousin to the'r mother j and who did not die till 1786 , 
wlien they were respectively, of the ages of 24, and 26. — I never 
heard them speak of any personal acquaintance with this Edward. 
His son, Edward, once dined with them, when quartered at Dover 
Castle , as Major of the Hampshire Militia. A long experience has 
shewn me, how very little a waj^ mere relationship of blood, (however 
near ) , goes in procuring affection , friendship , intimacy , or even 
intercourse : and yet there are people so stupid as to argue that even 
in distant connections want of communication is a strong presump- 
tion of want of relationship! On my father's side I had no collateral 
relation nearer than the Historian Gibbon : yet every sort of com- 
munication had ceased between our families: and when BI.'" Gihhou 
wrote his Memoirs , he had lost all trace of the Branch , from 
whence he sprung. I confess that this ignorance is very singular, 
when it is recollected, that his grandfather, who must have known 



222 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

M/ Gibbon's Fatlier died lo Nov. 1770 , aet. 64. Tiie 
history of his Hfe is given by his son ; and forms an in- 
teresting d'omestic portrait. The manners and habits of a 
country gentleman of a more ceremonious age gently exer- 
cise the fancy J and the moral and intellectual traits drawn 
by an elegant and practised pen, excite a kind of placid, 
benevolent , sympathy , vs^hich , vv^hile it gives food for re- 
flection , softems the heart. 

In the autumn of 1793 , M.'^ Gibbon returned for the 
last time from Lausanne , to die in his native country. 
He w^as in his 57*"^ year; and he flattered hiniself that 
he had yet many years of life to come. He went imme- 
diately lo his friend Lord Sheffield's at Sheffield Place in 
Sussex , whence I had a letter from him , inquiring for 
the particulars of the birth of his great grandfather , 
Matthew, etc. The short interval of his existence from that 
time, till its close in Jan.y following, is fully detailed by 
Lord Sheffield. 

His nearest relation on the paternal side was Catharine 
Lady Eliot , wife of the late Lord Eliot , and mother of 
the present Earl of St. Germains (i). She was daughter of 

so well whence liis father came, only died a year before his birth. 

I do not attribute it to vanity • for I cannot perceive that he 
gained any thing by it. M.^ Phillyps Gibbon , indeed , the chief 
of the Roluenden Branch, was among the Leaders of the Party in 
Parliament opposed to Sir Robert Walpole : but he was one, of 
whom the Historian takes no notice; and with whom his own Fa- 
mily seemed to have been in no communication. 

When the true descent was pointed out to M.'* G. , his curiosity 
was much awakened; and he expressed great pleasure. 

[i] This Earl's first wife was sister to the present Earl of Hard- 
wicke ; and grand - daughter of the Lord Chancellor Hardwicke j 
whose mother was a Gibbon. 

His 2d wife, the daughter of the Rt Hon. R. P. Carew, is also 
a great grand - daughter of Lord Chancellor Hardv/icke. 



GIBBON. 223 

Edward Elliston, EsqJ, whose mother was a daughter of 
Matthew Gibbon. 



Pedigree is a subject so trifling in the opinion of many 
readers ; so hateful in the opinion of others ; that I am 
wilhng to close this article with a few observations of 
more general interest. Not that I am the slave of public 
opinion': 1 can only be ashamed of that , which I do not 
believe to be true, or just. I believe love of pedigree to 
be inherent in our nature ; and to stand on wise moral , 
political , and philosophical principles. I write not for 
hire , or sale : I am not paid to please the taste , and 
feed the passions, of the multitude. I never was a favou- 
rite with the mob : nor ever hope to be ! Let those , to 
whom I am discordant , refrain from my pages ! I ask not 
their perusal. 

Blwr observes , that « Genius is a word which in common 
acceptation , extends much farther than to the objects of 
taste. It is used to signify that talent or aptitude , which 
we receive from nature , for excelling in any one thing 
whatever. Thus we speak of a genius for mathematics . 
as well as of a genius for poetry ; of a genius for war j 
for politics (i) ; or for any mechanical employment ». 

I think that , in this sense , Gibbon may be said to have 
possessed no common genius. Yet I doubt if a series of. 
accidental circumstances did not contribute largely to his 
excellence. His early foreign education^ and liis consequent 
intimacy with French v/ritings ; his admiration qf the new. 
philosophy , and pointed style of Voltaire , together with 
his patient study of the voluminous learning of what may 
be called demi - classicalitj , enabled him , when once he 

[i] Rhetoric, and Bt-lles-Lettres , i. 47. 



224 THE AWTI- CRITIC 

had fixed on sueh a subject as The Decline and Fall of 
the Roman Empire, to combine, to an inexhaustible extent, 
what had never been combined before , either with refe- 
rence to matter or manner. 

He had lived in the society of the British Capital both 
among rank and genius , at a time when the minds of men 
had become philosophical; and were in a state of activity, 
and fervor. He belonged to the literary club of Johnson , 
Burke , Goldsmith , Garrick , Reynolds , the Wartons , etc. 
We may imagine him , while his talents and acquirements 
had not yet burst into celebrity , listening with compla- 
cence tothe gigantic and irresistible force of Johnson ; to the 
blaze of Burke's fancy , dazzling at first , but still brigh- 
tening and multiplying at every flash; to the laughable 
interludes of Goldsmith ; to the pure classicality of Joseph 
Warton, and to the magical and electrifying tones of Garrick. 
Tapping his snuff-box , with the shrug of an higher cast 
of manners; the man of fortune; the travelled Gentleman; 
the senator ; the Lord of Trade ; we see him listening de- 
lighted , yet with a most fashionable composure of coun>^ 
tenance ; then interposing a few quaint words , which by 
their contrast add zest to the struggle of intellect and 
genius ! 

At length comes forth the little-expected Quarfo Volume, 
full of polish, and point, and subtlety, and criticism, and 
multifarious reading , and clear , and rich compression ! 
<f AVhat this petit-raaitre gentleman , with his ruffles , and 
his sword, and his snuff-box; with his ceremonious civi- 
lity , and his French phrases , and French address ! he 
beats us all by the labour of his anvil ; and the smoothness 
of his file ; by his diversified and abstruse studies ; and 
the ingenuity and novelty of his views ! » The surprize 
lighted the fuel of fashion; and the name of Gibbon became 
universal ! 



HARDWICKE. 225 



LXVIII. 
LORD CHANCELLOR HARDWICKE. 

Among the Lord High Chancellors of England, Philip 
YoRKE Earl of Hardwicke stands in the highest rank as 
a profound lawyer, and enlightened judge , whose DecpiEes 
are in every respect a standard of excellence. Such a man , 
it is admitted , can gain or lose little by discDSslons of 
birth and origin. He shines by his own pure and steady 
light ; and requires no adventitious aid to the splendor of 
his name. On this ground his descendants seem to have 
been willing to leave it. They therefore treated with silent 
scorn the silly stories of his very low origin. It is true 
that he was not descended from Nobles , or even from 
the higher order of Gentry ; but his connections were 
respectable, and wealthy • and he was heir by his paternal 
and maternal grandfathers , in the parishes of Alkham and 
St. Margaret's-at-CHffe, near Dover, to estates, which must, 
( I presume ) , have been of the value of L. 5oo a year. 

His father practised the Law at Dover, and died in 1721. 
His grandfather Simon Yorke was a Merchant (i) there. 

I have already mentioned the name and connections of 
his mother in a former article. She was daughter and heir 

[i] So described in some legal instruments in my possession : — 
and also ( if I recollect rightly ) , in his Tf^ilL The Mercani'de 
Houses at Dover have in our days, and at various times, been of 
great wealth and consideralion : witness the Fectors, Mincts , Bra- 



29 



226 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

of Richard Gibbon of Dover ; and widow of hei" cousin 
Edward Gibbon , EsqJ , of IVestcllJ'fe. Slie had by her 
first husband, ( to whom she was second wife ) , an only 
son Philip, who died young (i). 

A great deal of degrading conjecture, and lying gossip^ 
has been founded on the circumstance of MJ Yorke not 
having received an University education. It has been 
handed down to me, by persons who had the best chance 
of inheriting correct information , that those who had the 
conduct of his education , always intending him for the 
Bar, deemed (rightly or wrongly ('-i),) another course more 
efficacious : and put him a pupil to M.^ Salheld , a cele- 
brated conveyancer. 

It is demonstrable , that there could have been no want 
of funds to give him an University education. I have fre- 
quently communicated the following instance of this great 
man's classical scholarship , as it has been transmitted to 
me by my family. He is said to have accoiupanied the 
present of an Hare with the following Latin Epigram : 
Mitto tibi leporem : gratos mihi mitte lepores I 
Sal mea commcndat munera : vestra sales I 

[i] About thirty years ago the firmorial acliievoiiients of tliese 
Gibbons were to he seen in the Churches both of £t. James and 
St. Mary at Dover. Tlie arms of Gibbon were quartered with those 
<ji PhillpoL , which was the name of the wife of Philip G. son of 
Thomas G. who purchased Ji^csldiffe estate , of Lord Borough , 
about 1 590. Scarcely any others of the same a:itiquily remained in 
these Churches. This is evidence that long before Ldrd Ilardwicke's 
birth they were considered of the upper rank of the inhabitants of 
Dover. 

[2] I have always been told that my grandfather, who was ten 
years his senior, (and had married the danghter-in-law and cousin of 
his mother) was much consulted in directing tlie course of his studies. 
If -such advice came from him, who was an extensive scholar, it would 
excite my surprise; but perhaps he imagined that his own prok^ssiona 
career had been impeded by the time consumed at Oxford ! 



HARD WICK E. 227 

If he was really tlie author of this Epigram , ( and I 
have the greatest confidence in the accuracy of the autho- 
rity from which I received it : and it has , besides , now 
appeared in print many years without being contradicted), 
he must have been very critically versed in classical com- 
position. — 

It seems to me to have been an extraordinary fate 
befalling one family , to have produced in the space oi forty - 
seven years two such men as Lord Chancellor Harchviche , 
and MJ Gibbon , the Historian ; one indeed by the mother ; 
the other by the father : yet both clearly of the same 
blood. I have been a good deal reproached for being proud 
of this blood! When other famihes of high sounding titles, 
and vast estates, produce their equals, then I will allow 
them to insult me with their superiority. 



Lord Chancellor Hardwicke was born Dec. i. 1690; was 
appointed Solicitor-General Jan. i. 1720, at the age of 29 , 
Attorney- General , Jan. 17. 1723; aged 82; Chief- Justice 
of the King's Bench, and Lord Harchviche ^ Oct. 3i. 1733 : 
aet. 4^; and Earl of Hardwicke, lyS/i; aged 63. He 
died" March 6. 1764, aet. 75. 

His second son Charles perhaps possessed less force and 
solidity of mind than his father; but he had more genius; 
and possessed an heart of the deepest sensibility, and the 
most refined sentiment. He was an elegant and general 
scholar ; and in the midst of the thorny paths of popular 
ambition and state affairs, had all the glowing irradiations 
and all the nice emotions of retired Imagination. He was 
born Dec. 3o. 1722; and 17 Jan. 1770, was appointed 
Lord Chancellor at the age of 47 ; but died on the 3.d 
day after his appointment. His mother was niece to the 
illustrious Lord Chancellor Somers, His own first wife 



228 THE AWTJ-CRITIC 

was daughter and heir of William Freman, Esq.^, of Hamels, 
in Hertfordshire, by Catherine heiress of Sh' Thomas Pope 
Blount, of Tlttenhanger , in the same County , Bar.' (i). 
By her he was father of the present Earl of Hardwicke, K. G. 



LXIX. 

CONSOLATIOlNr : A POEM ADDRESSED TO 
LADY BRYDGES. 

BY EDWARD QUILLIWAIV , ESQ/ 



Thy Child was lull'd on Death's cold couch to sleep ; 

Years since have past , and yet I see thee weep ; 

Yet yet , by busy memory kept alive , 

The heart-struck Mother's griefs , alas , survive ! 

Is there no blessed spell, no opiate blest, 

To cheat a Mother's memory to rest ? 

Look on the lovely treasures that remain; 

Let these seduce thee from regrets so vain ! 

Oh , no : by links too powerful are allied 

The joy for these that live, the woe for Him that died. 

In life's young season, when the world was new. 
And Love adorn'd it with enchantment's hue , 
He, the first pledge which Love awoke to light, 
Was more than angel in thy partial sight. 
Ah! who can tell the youthful Mother's joy, 
When first her arms received her infant Boy? 
When first she saw, what Fancy help'd to trace, 

[i] See the Insniption for Sir WllUam Malnwariiig. 



CONSOLATION. 229 

The Father's features in his little face ! 
When first she gave her first maternal kiss , 
Ah ! what are words to paint a mothers bliss ! 

Fed from thy breast, in charms the infant grew , 
Fresh as the may-morn flower that drinks the dew. 
Then, as the term of boyhood just began , 
How well the Boy gave promise of the Man, 
When, warm for enterprize, and pall'd with ease, 
The gallant Child went forth , and dar'd the Seas ! 
What serves it here in long detail to tell 
The proving chances that the Child befell : 
Each toil and watch endur'd by day and night , 
Each rough assault of tempest or of fight; 
To tell what lands he saw ; how oft he bore 
Some classic relic from the famous shore : 
How oft return'd ( ah ! why again to roam ? ) 
To taste the dear felicity of home , 
And pause awhile from Ocean's rude alarms ; 
The harbour of his rest a Mother's arms. 

I saw , ere last the Wanderer left thy side , 
This cherish'd object of thy pain and pride. 
I saw him clad with beauty as a vest : 
His graceful form the graceful mind express'd. 
I mark'd that mind, so young, yet so matur'd, 
By painful trial manfully endur'd. 
Talent's strong sun had forced the vernal shoot; 
At once it bore the blossom aud the fruit. 
Then Friendship too , in sympathy with thee , # ,. 

Was idly dreaming what the youth would be : 
A Hero , diadem'd with Glory's crown , 
To gild his ancient name with new renown. 
Where is he now ? thus gifted and thus fair , 
Could not the hand of heaven the stroke forbear ? 
So young , and good , and beautiful , and brave ! 



230 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Was it not hard to doom liim to the grave ? 

To bid Disease assail with jealous tooth 

The rich unfolding roses of his youth , 

And, blighting them, the Mother's hope to blight. 

The hope that promised such a long delight? 

Yet , it were something still , if o'er the clay 

Of Him thus early snatch 'd from life away, 

Maternal love but now and then might keep 

A little sacred interval , to w^eep. 

Alas ! fond Mother ! this too is denied ; 

Far, far away from home , from Thee , he died. 

Minorca's air receiv'd his latest breath ; 

It's earth too gave his narrow cell of death. 

To dew his fading cheek , with pious tear , 

No parent , brother , sister tended near : 

No sister , brother , parent , e'er must weep 

Beside the bed , wherein his ashes sleep. 

Child of the Ocean ! had the troubled wave , 
Thine own proud element , become thy grave , 
When all thy soul with generous rage was warm'd , 
Had'st Thou been struck while gallant battle storm'd 
Then by thy fall had fame at least been brought! 
So whispers Fancy to a mother's thought. 
Delusion ! could that mother's thought have borne 
The bosom gash'd , the limb asunder torn , 
The life-blood , none perhaps its tide to check , 
Effusive o'er the horror- drenched deck , 
T% form convulsed, the shriek of torment wild. 
The last dull moaning of her dying Child ? 
No, no, though doom'd to fall; poor Boy, t' was well, 
That not in Battle's hideous fray He fc!I. 

Thy tears , fond mother , though so long they flow , 
Are not the rash impiety of woe. 
R.ebellion brands not the afflicted mind , 



CONSOLATfON. 



231 



Regret may deeply mourn , yet be resigned : 
And Heaven , in mercy to a mother's grief , 
Permits those tears to lend a sad relief. 
Perchance at times tis e'en allow'd thy Boy 
To quit for Thee his Paradise of joy ! 
Perchance, e'en now, the disembodied Saint 
Is hovering near , to silence Grief's complaint , 
Breathe comfort to his mother's aching heart , 
And act at once the Son's and Angel's pari. 

I do believe , that when the Good ascend , 
To live the empyreal life that ne'er shall end , 
'Tis not denied them in that world to meet 
Those for whose sakes e'en this bad world was sweet ; 
That friends and kindred are allow'd above 
Each to know each again , in purer love ; 
That in the presence of the Great Ador'd , 
Again the spouse may meet the spouse deplor'd ; 
Sister and Brolher form the ring again , 
And parted Lovers bind the broken chain ; 
Fathers amidst their gather'd children rest , 
And tender mothers bless them and be bless'd. 

I do believe to mothers such as Thou , 
Will Heaven this perfect blessedness allow. 
When Seraphs up to Heaven thy soul translate , 
Thy child shall meet Thee at the golden gate; 
Shall bid thee welcome to the Promised Land , 
Shall guide thee in through all the glorious band ; 
Y/hlle all the Angels clap their Avings for joy , 
And hail ye both, the mother and her Boy! 

And these, yet left to her who gave them birth, 
To cheer her further sojourn upon earth , 
These who with youth elate , and blind to care , 
Now round thee wanton, shall rejoin thee there. 
There too , where never the high heart is rack'd 



232 THE A.]yTI-CRITIC 

Where never cares the noble mind distract, 
Where, FeeUng , Fancy, Genius, unrepress'd , 
May thrill , expand , exalt the unburlhen'd breast , 
There shall the generous Lyre , that here below 
Wafts scarce a note beside the note of woe , 
No more by sorrow warp'd , by envy jarr'd , 
Breathe all the lofty spirit of the Bard , 
Whom , while thine offspring listen to that Lyre , 
Their eyes and hearts shall know , and bless their Sire. 
Lee Priory, Sept. 16. i8i5. 



The following Extract from the Gentleman's Magazine' 
for April, 181 2, may explain some part of the preceding Poem. 

« Febuary aS.t'n, 1812, died at Minorca, of a fever brought 
on by the measles , Grey Matthew Brydges (of his Majesty's 
ship, Malta, Admiral Hallowell), third son(i) of Sir Egerton 
Brydges, of Lee Priory near Canterbury. He was aged only 
fourteen years and four months; of which he had been five 
and an half at sea ; having embarked in the Glatton, Captain 
Seccombe , in July 1806, with whom he remained in the 
Mediterranean till that lamented officer's death under the 
walls of Reggio , in Feb. 1808. In June 1808, after only 
a month spent at home, he embarked on board Le Tigre , 
Captain Hallowell , at Deal ; and sailed for the Baltic , and 
thence accompanied it again to the Mediterranean in No- 
vember, where he remained till the ship again returned to 
Plymouth , in July 181 1; and was paid off. After a vaca- 
tion of only four months, which he spent in the bosom of his 
family , he embarked with his old Captain ( who had now 
obtained a Flag); in the Malta ; and sailed in January 1812 
a third time for the Mediterranean. Thus had this extraor- 

[i] He was eldest son to the Lady to -syhom the Poem is addressed. 



PtRYDGES. 233 

dinary Boy , in the very years of Childhood , passed a 
life of activity , extent , and public service , which falls to 
the lot of few men . however aged. How noble his spirit 
was ; how enlarged his understanding ; how manly and 
solid his knowledge ; yet with the warmest and tenderest 
domestic affections; it would only seem like exaggeration 
to describe- It had appeared as if he was forming his 
wonderful character for some mighty part on the grand 
theatre of the world; but it has pleased Divine Providence 
to shew us how vain and fallacious are all our hopes here , 
and to turn the glory of his parents and family into a 
subject of inconsolable sorrow and regret. He died the 
last week of February (his ship being absent on a Cruize), 
and was buried near several other British officers under 
one of the bastions of Fort Philip ; attended by his Coun- 
trymen , Capt Kittoe of the Hibernia , and M."" Legeyt , 
who , accidentally hearing of the melancholy event , most 
kindly gave their services on the awfnl occasion ». 



LXX. 

m MEMORY 
OF EDWARD WILLIAM GEORGE BRYDGES; 

Who died at Lee Priory on ihe 1 3.*^ of June, 1 8 1 6 : 

Aged Fifteen Years and Seven Months. 

Another blow from heaven ! — and wherefore thus ? — 
Shall human woe the act of heaven discuss ? 
Shall roused Affliction lift to God its eye. 
And, knowing that he will'd it , question why? — 

3o 



234 THE AIN'TJ-CmTIC 

Tried Mother , bow tliy head , and quell thy breast , 
And check the unholy murmur ere express'd ! 
There was too much of good about thee still, 
Baffling the jealous counterpoise of ill. 
The draught of life was yet too strong for care ; 
Scheines were too quick and hopes too busy there ; 
So grief again , as bubbles mantled up , 
Was sent to tame the spirit of the cup. 

Ask thine own heart — descend into that cell , 
Where lives the Priestess of Truth's Oracle , 
Conscience , that breathes self-knowledge : She will say , 
A Mother's pride too deeply rooted lay 
Within thy bosom ; giving thoughts of earth 
More room than aught terrestrial should be worth. 
Thy love of thine own lovely race was such 
As held thee fetter'd to the world too much : 
So Death was made thy visitor again , 
To break another rivet of the chain , 
That to thy mind's ambition might be given 
A freer aspiration after heaven. 

Twice on the treasure of thy soul the hand 
That lent it has enforced a stern demand. 
Yet think, afflicted Parent, for thy peace, 
How may the seeming loss thy wealth increase ! 
If both so early in the grave they lie , 
They both were innocent, and fit to die. 
Fairer than stars their spirits glow above ; 
And from their sphere depends a chain of love , 
A chain of light to thee and thine descending, * 
Whereby riven hearts in mystic hnks are blending; 
And the pure fires with which those spirits glow , 
Can thrill and Hghten on the hearts below. 

Direct thy gaze , thou cherisher of woes , 
Where yon meek Spire the hamlet's temple shews! 



BRYDGES. 

Is there no comfort in that place of prayer ? — - 
Alas , those tears deny all solace there : 
Fuller , and faster at the view they fall ; 
As though that sight were bitterer than all. 
Well , who shall censure those o'erflowing eyes ? 
Religion's self will scarce refuse her sighs. 
We all remember when each Sabbath Morn 
Saw thy young group that humble fane adorn ; 
With kim , among the rest , of guileless brow — 
Where is that dear and guileless Edward now ! — 
When then ye glanced upon the vault beneath , 
'No echo warn'd you from that seat of death, 
Whose shade at last must shroud you all, that doom 
Adjudg'd him next into that dark cold room. 
Dealh stole upon thee in a doubtful mask ; 
The black des'royer wanton'd with his task; 
And mock'd with promise thy maternal hope ; 
And gave — that's, some relief — thy virtues scope. 
We all remember — how can we forget — 
Those nightly vigils , that should soothe regret ;. 
Those dally cares, and duties overpaid; 
While the youth wasted to a bloodless shade. 
We all remember how , until the last , 
Clung by his side this mother unsurpast; 
Caught every tone, consulted every look, 
Read every thought , and every wish o'ertook ; 
And , in despite of pain's exerted fangs , 
Foil'd the tormentor of his keenest pangs. 
Propp'd on his pillow as the victim lay , 
W hile life j ust pruned her wings to fleet away ^ 
Cheer' d by her flutter, it was sweet, he said. 
To lie thus careless on a tranquil bed : 
And thence behold the trees in tender green, 
And all the freshness of a vernal scene ; 



236 THE AISTI-CllTTIC 

And feel the breeze that sometimes Hew by stealth 
To fan his cheek, and warble words of health. — 
Then came the hour! — the spirit waxing dimj 
The helpless , hopeless feebleness of limb ; 
The wandering hands that quarrell'd with the air ; 
The glance that flickered round , but knew not where ; 
The language wilder than the trackless wind ; 
The last delirious energies of mind ; 
The cheeks, like wither'd aspen leaves in hue, 
And like those leaves all coldly shuddering too ; 
The quivering throat's half-choak'd and struggling cry ; 
And last — that fix'd expression of the eye I — 
Not yet ; not yet ; it cannot yet be o'er : — 
The soul still lights that face — O gaze no more , 
Unhappy Father I Wherefore didst thou stay , 
Watching the progress of thine own decay , 
The dread mortality of thine own flesh — 
That seems in those that yet remain so fresh ? 
Av»ay, even She who walch'd as none have watch'd, 
She , the poor Mother with (he heart unmatch'd , 
Dragg'd by the arm of friendship from the room , 
Has left him — to the agents of the tomb ! 
Take thy last look , and let it linger not; 
And let us lead thee from this blighted spot ! 
In your sepulchral chamber , corse to corse , 
Ye still shall meet , in spite of this divorce ; 
In the eternal Kingdom , soul to soul , 
Ye still may live, when planets cease to roll ! 



STAWZAS. 237 



LXXI. 

STANZAS WRITTEN AT SUDELEY CASTLE. 

c 

Addressed to Sir jE'. Brydges. 

BY EDWARD QUILLINAN ESQ.'^ 
I. 

Where is thy glory, Sudeley ? thougli thy wall 
Willi stubborn strength the hand of Time defies , 
The sun looks down into thy roofless hall , 
And tlu'ough thy courts with splendor's mockery pries. 
Where are thine ancient Lords? the Brave? the wise? 
Crumbled to dust in yonder Gothic Fane. 
Where are their children's children ? None replies. 
Swept from their trunk in Chance's hurricane , 
The branches wave no more on Cotswold's old domain. 

II. 

Yet here the sons of Chandos , in their day 
Of greatness, ruled in no ungentle sort : 
Here Want was succour'd ; Sorrow here grew gay ; 
And Winchcombe's Castle was no Tyrant's Fort : 
Here too the imperial Dame wilh Barons girt, 
She who could make the Croons and Nations bow, 
Relax'd , at Welcome's voice , her lion port , 
And soften'd into smiles her siat'^Iv bro ■* : 
What \^ast thou then , famed Pile! Ah changed! what art 
thou now ! 



238 THE A.NTI-CRIT1C 

III. 

Now savage elders flourish in tliy courts ; 
The thistle now thy lorn recesses haunts ; 
Perch'd on thy walls the wild geranium sports , 
And the rude mallows , deck'd in purple , flaunts : 
Behold , proud tastle , thine inhabitants ! 
See how their nodding heads the zephyr hail , 
As if they mock'd thee with triumphant taunts , 
As history's banners to each passing gale 
From some dismantled Fort relate their boastful tale. 

IV. 

Are they not emblems , these obtrusive flowers , 
Thus choaking up the sculptured Leopard's trace , 
And the old Cross on Sudeley's honour'd towers , 
Are they not emblems of the motly race 
Upraised by Mammon from their humble place ? 
Those weeds that on the ruins of the Great 
Arise in rank luxuriance , and deface 
The genealogic types of reverend date , 
And flirt new symbols forth, and wear a gaudy state. 

V. 

Brydgcs ; the proud tear in thy dark eye swells, 
When History thy Forefather's fame displays , 
And hoar Tradition garrulously tells 
Tales that their shades to the mind's vision raise , 
Like forms shewn dimly through a Twilight haze : 
Fancy the while in her insidious strain. 
Whispering s\^eet words _, exaggerates the praise, 
The power , and wealth , and chivalry , and train 
Of thy baronial Sires . . . magnificently vain. 



STANz^\.s. 239 

VI. 

Then follows Memory's fancy-withering part : 
She bends, as a fond Sister, o'er the Urn 
Of Youth's dead Expectations , the sad Heart ; 
And culls up e^^ery woe that thou hast borne , 
And murmurs till the bosom is o'erworn , 
And the plumed spirit of ambition droops. 
Thus to regrets life's vernal projects turn : 
Pain's poisonous fruit succeeds the flowery hopes 
That bloom'd in Denton's vale, and Wootton's sylvan slopes. 

VII. 

Yet why repine ? . . . no more the Lydian stream 
Devolves in its old bed the golden tide ; 
Ancestrel dignities have ceased to beam 
Upon the children of a house of pride : 
And thou , tis true , hast been severely tried : 
To the maternal legacy of care 
Thy birthright by no brother was denied ; 
Wo smooth supplanter kindly claimed thy share, 
As hard Rebecca's Hope beguiled the Patriarch's heir. 

VIII. 

Yet w hy , too fondly querulous , repine ? 
Still many a pure delight thy journey cheers ; 
And , though a way with thorns perplex'd is thine , 
Fresh flowers still greet thee in the vale of tears; 
And Love v\^alks with thee to the goal of years j 
And thou hast treasures, as Cornelia's prized; 
And even of v^orldly state enough appears. 
And if enough , the rest should be despised ; 
Peace visits not the heart where pride is unchastised. 



240 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

IX. 

Of briers tlie earth , of clouds the heaven to clear , 
Hast thou not too the love of lore and song ? 
If Sudeley now the haughty head could rear , 
As when its battlements withstood the strong , 
And frown'd upon Rebellion , if the throng 
Of chivalry and beauty , as of yore , 
Still danced its beryl-glittering halls along, 
And thou wert Lord of hill_, and plain, and tower ^ 
While all within was pomp , and all without was power; 

X. 

Could all the specious pageantry convey 
A genuine pleasure to the thoughtful mind , 
Which one , who loves like thee the Muse's lay , 
Within the shades of quiet cannot find ? 
Ambition's pillars shake with every wind , 
And like these Ruins, soon or late, must fall; 
But the green wreaths in Learning's bowers entwined 
Will grace the tomb , as o' er yon Chapel-wall 
The clustering ivy spreads its rich enduring pall. 



LXXII. 

EPITAPH 

In the Ch urch of Peivshurst, Kent. 

Here lies the Body of 

William Egerton ^ LLD. 

He was 

Grandson of John , Earl of Bridgewater , 



EPITAPH. 241 

But received less honour from his noble descent^ 

Than from his personal qualificaiions : 

For he had a strong memory^ 

And most ejccellent parts ; 

Both which were greatly improved by 

A learned education : 

And as his birth gave him an opportunity 

Of being brought up , and 

hiving in the best company ; 

So he made a suitable improvement from it; 

Happily mixing the knowlege of the Scholar 

With the politeness of the Gentleman. 

He had talents 

Peculiarly fitted for conversation ; 

For , with a great vivacity , 

He had a command and fluency of words , 

TVhich he well knew how to express 

To such advantage^ 

As might make him either entertaining or instructive. 

Thus accomplished , it is no wonder 

He was distinguished in his profession: 

Being made Chaplain to two succeeding Kings ^ 

Rector of Penshurst , 

And All-Hallows , Lombard street; 

Chancellor and Prebendary of Hereford ; 

And Prebendary of Canterbury. 

He left behind him 

Two daughters and one son , 

By Anne , daughter cf Sir Francis Head , Bart, 

Who caused this marble to be laid down , 

As a slender memorial 

Of her gratitude and affection 

To the memory of the best of Husbands. 

He died Feb. 26, lySy, cet 67. 

li 



242 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

ANOTHER. 

Near this place lielli the Body 

Of Anne , relict of William Egerton LLD. 

Who died March 5, 1778, 

Aged 74. 

The constant tenor of her life 

Was the best preparation for death. 

As she was eminently distinguished 

"For discharging every duty in life 

In the most amiable manner^ 

And upon the purest motives. 

All who knew her , loved and revered her , 

And must sooner or later be happy , 

Jf they follow her example. 



LXXIII. 
ROUSSEAU. 



We talk a great deal of the necessity of the virtue 
of action or conduct combined with the virtues of the 
mind. If Ave speak of the virtues of the mind , of which 
the picture is conveyed to the Public by the pen , the 
conduct of the author may concern the happiness of him- 
self and of those immediately connected with him ; but 
the fruit of the mind alone is that with which the Public 
have any interest. 

The beautiful imagination , and exquisite sentiments of 
Rousseau are calculated to elevate, to melt , and to instruct 
us, unqualified and undiminished by a regard to the in- 
consistencies of his temper, or his actions. 



ROUSSEATT. 243 

Madame de Stael in her Lettres sur Rousseau says with 
as modi justice as felicitous eloquence : 

« II avait une grande puissance de raison sur les ma- 
tiercs abstraites , sur les objets qui n'ont de realite que 
dans la pensee , et une extravagance absolue sur tout ce 
qui tient a la connoissance du monde ; il avait de tout une 
trop grande dose ; a force d'etre superieur , il etait pres 
d'etre fou. C'etait un homme fait pour vivre dans la re- 
traite avec un petit iiombre de personnes d'un esprit 
borne , afin que rien n'ajoutat a son agitation interieure, 
et qu'il fut environne de calrae. II etait bon ; les inferieurs 
I'adoraient ; ce sont eux qui jouissent sur tout de cette 
qualite ; mais Paris I'avait trouble* II etait ne pour la so- 
ciete de la nature , et non pour celle d'insdtution. Tous 
ses ouvrages expriment I'horreur qu'elle lui inspirait ; ij 
ne lui fut possible ni de la comprendre , ni de la suppor- 
ter ; c'etait un sauvage des bords de I'Orenoque , qui se 
fut trouve beureux de passer sa vie a regarder couler 
I'eau. II etait ne coutemplatif , et la reverie faisait son 
bonlieur supreme ; son esprit et son cceur tour-a-tour 
s'emparaient de lui. II vivait dans son imagination ; le 
monde passait doucement sous ses yeux ; la religion, les 
liommes , I'amour , la politique I'occupaient successivement. 
Apres s'etre promene seul tout le jour , il revenait calme et 
doux : les medians gagnent-ils a rester avec eux-memes ! 
On ne peut pas dire cependant que Rousseau fut ver- 
tueux , parce qu'il faut des actions et de la suite dans 
ces actions pour meriter cet doge ; mais c'etait un homme 
qu'il failait laisser penser sans en rien exiger de plus ; 
qu'il failait conduire comme un enfant, et ecouter comme 
un oracle ; dont le coeur etait profondement sensible , et 
qu'on devait menager, non avec les precautions ordinaires, 
mais avec celles qu'un tel cai^actere exigeait ; il ne failait 
pas s'en fier a sa propre innocence. » 



244 THE ANTI-CRITIC 



LXXIV. 

MEMOIR OF MJ' MOTsTAGU. 



Extracted from Biographic universelle , Vol. i^^ p.l^i^, 
Paris 1821. 

Montagu (Elizabeth), dame anglaise ^ aussi dlstinguee 
par son erudition que par son esprit , etait fiUe de Ma- 
tliieu Robinson , riclie proprietaire , et d'Elisabeth Drake. 
Elle naquit a York, le 2 Octobre 1720, et fut elevee a 
Cambridge , oh residait sa famille , par les soins du doc- 
teur Conycrs Middleton , second raari de son aieule. Le 
docteur Middleton exigeait que sa jeune et belle pupille 
lui presentat le resume de toutes les conversations savantes 
auxquelles elle etait souvent presente dans sa societe. II 
I'habitua ainsi a ecouter attentivement et a analyser dans 
son esprit tout ce qu'elle entendait. 

Elle epousa , en 174^5 Edouard Montagu, petit-fils du 
premier comte de Sandwich , et membre de plusieurs par- 
lements successifs pour le bourgs d'lluniiugdon. II mou- 
rut en 1775, laissant a sa veu\e une fortune considerable, 
dont elle fit le plus noble usage pendant le cours de sa 
longue carriere , qu'elle termina , le 25 Aout 1800, a I'age 
de quatre-vingts ans. 

Mistriss Montagu se fit remarquer de bonne heure comma 
auteur; d'abord , par ses Dialogues des Morts, publles avec 
ceux dc Lord Lyttelton ; et, ensnile , par un Essai sur 
le genie et les ccrits de Shaf^speare ^ qui parut en 1769, 
ouvrage classique et elegant , 011 Ton trouve beaucoup plus 



MONTAGU. 



245 



de savoir et de critique qu'on n'en devait attendre d'une 
femme du grand monde. 

La maniere dont les jugements de Voltaire sont releves 
dans cet Essai , entrepris surtout pour venger Shakespeare 
des sarcasmes de I'auteur de la Henriade , atlira a Mistriss 
Montagu I'animadversion de cet homme illustre , qu'elle 
avail autrefois connu en Angleterre : il ne lui pardonna 
jamais , et il ne pouvait prononcer son nom de sang- 
froid ( I ). Mistriss Montagu ayant fait un Yoyage en 
France , envoya son Essai sur Shakspeare a Voltaire , 
avec cette epigraphe : 

Pallas te , hoc vulnere _, Pallas 

Immolat. 
Se trouvant a Paris, quelques semaines apres (1776), 
elle apprit , en societe , que le pLilosoplie de Ferney avail 
dit que ce n'etait pas une merveilie de trouver quelques 
perles dans I'enorme fumier de Shakspeare : elle repliqua 
vivement , en faisant illusion aux emprunts de Voltaire , 
que c'etait pourtant a ce fumier qu'il devait une partie 
de son meilleur grain. 

Mistriss Montagu vivait dans rintimile de tout ce qu'il 
y avail de grand et d'illustre dans les lettres en Angleterre. 
Pope , Johnson , Goldsmith , Pulteney , depuis Lord Bath , 
Lyttelton , Burke , etc. , formaient sa societe (2). Le doc- 

(i) Voltaire, dans sa Letlre a V Academic Francahe ^ hie le 25 
Aout 1776 5 j^^ge severement le tragicjue anglais. II avait fait la 
meine chose dans son Appel a toules les nations de V Europe ^ 1761? 
m-8. Mistriss Montagu prit la plume pour la defense de son coru- 
patriolej el son ouvrage a ete traduit en francais sous ce titre : 
Apologie de Shakspeare j en reponse a lu criLicjue de M. de V^ol- 
taire ^ i777? in-^. Voltaire la refuta dans une nouvelle Lettre a 
I'Acudemie, iraprimte a la tete d.'h-ene. A. B.-t. 

(2) Mistriss Montagu aval forme une societe litteraiie qui, pen- 
dant plusieurs aunees , attira raUention generale , sous le nom de 



246 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

teur Beattie et Mistriss Carter fureiit , pendant toute leur 
vie , ses amis et ses correspondants. 

Mistriss Montagu joignait a un profond jugement et a 
une imagination Ti"ve et brillante , nn gout aussi pur que 
severe. Le recueil des Lettres que nous avons d'elle , et 
tout ce que les contemporains racontent du cliarme de sa 
conversation , a-la-fois instructive et piquante , prouvent 
qu'elle raeritait I'estime que les gens les plus erudits ac- 
cordaient a ses talents. 

Elle avait cependant le def'aut de vouloir se conformer 
trop strictement aux moeurs et aux usages du grand monde 
qu'elle frequentait. Le desir excessif qu'elle avait de plaire 
et d'obtenir la reputation de femme a la mode, lui faisant 
souvent adopter un ton leger et frivole , qui trompait les 
observateurs superficiels 

Depuis sa mort , quatj'e volumes de sa cokrespondance 
ont ete publiee par son neveu ( Mathieu Montagu ) : il 
parait qu'il se propose d'en faire paraitre encore , qui com- 
pleteront sans doute I'idee favorable qu'on s'est formee de 
Mistriss Montagu. D. -Z.-S. » 



Club des has Mens ( Blue stockuigs Club ) . On s'est livre , daus le 
temps , a beaucoup de coiijectures pour trouver I'origine de cette 
singuliere dtnomination. II parait qu'elle pi'oviiit de ce qu'uae 
persoime qui en iaisant paitie, s'elaut excusee de paraitre a uue 
des premieres reunions, parce qu'eJle etait en deshabille du matin, 
il lui fut repondu qu'on s'occupait peu de costume daus une societe 
uniquement consacree a cultiver I'esprit. « On fait si peu d'atten- 
« tion a rhabillement des personnes qui s'j rendent , ajouta-t-on , 
» qu'un gentilhomme en has bleus ne serait meme pas trouve mis 
» ridiculement. » 

It arose, in truth, from the Blue StocJdngs worn bj M.^ Stilling- 
fleet , a man distinguished both in literature, and as a naturalist, 
v/ho was a;i early and constant frequenter of this Society. Hannah 
More has written a Poem on the subject. 



MONTAGU. 247 

The 

FOLLOWING CHARACTER of M^^ MONTAGU 

is extracted from the Biographical Peerage, 
London, 1817, 18. ° voLi\,p. 352. 



« Few persons enjoyed as distinguished a reputation in 
her day as M.^'^ Montagu. Her extraordinary talents, ad- 
ded to a beautiful person _, made her , from a very early 
age, the admiration of all h r acquaintance. Her father 
was a man of wit , and a polished gentleman , who lived 
among the higher ranks , and was never happy out of 
society : a country life , and the manners of country squires , 
were his detestation; and he was not contented but \"fhen 
he could escape from the solitary mansion of Horton to 
the animation of Bond-street , ai d the refinement and 
cheerfulness of the evening circles which a court and ca- 
pital afforded. The daughter inherited much of her father's 
liveliness and love of pleasure. Her connections in Cam- 
bridgeshire had introduced her from a child at the house 
of the second Earl of Oxford , at Wimpole , the resort of 
wit and learning; where her lively spirit and brilliant faculties, 
soon caught the emulation of genius and fame. Lord Oxford's 
daughter, afterwards Duchess of Portland,, washer companion; 
and she was listened to as a prodigy for colloquial powers ; 
while her letters , abounding in premature command both 
of ideas and language , were read with praise , delight and 
astonishment. Thus flattered distinguished and followed , 
she thought that the winters , which her mother dedicated 
with unweaired affection to her nursery amid the lone- 
liness of the groves of Horton , were to her but the bu- 
rial of faculties which she panted to display on the theatres 



248 THE A.1VTI-CRTTIC 

of the world. Yet her goodnature made her endure it 
with cheerfulness, while she amused herself by describing 
to her correspondents v.ith admirable viyacily and hu- 
mour some of the scenes and manners around her. At 
length , at an early age , when little more than twenty , 
the attraction of an honourable alliance , which might 
retain her in the highest circles , induced her to marry 
M.'" Montagu , whose age was nearly double her own : 
this occurred about 1742. Hence her wit, her beauty, 
her amiable and attractive manners , put her at the head 
of fashion and of Htterature. Lord Lyttelton , Lord Bath, 
Gilbert West, D.^^ Johnson, MJ'' Carter, M.'^^^ Talbot, 
and numerous others , all encircled her, adorned her table, 
corresponded ^^ith her, and gave her their confidence , or 
their devotion. About 1765 , she published her Essay on 
the Genius of Shahespeare ; a composition of so much elo- 
quence , and in so brilliant a style of criticism , as to 
have suppressed even all attempts at any thing of the same 
kind. M.^^ Montagu survived the date of this work between 
3o and 40 years ; but gave to the world no other publi- 
cation. During this long period , she continued to corres- 
pond with many of the most eminent literati of her day ; 
and to exhibit in them a mind of such extraordinary acti- 
vity , so rich in reflections upon life and manners, as well 
as in expression and the brilliance of inexhaustible imagery, 
as to have put them hitherto out of any danger of being 
eclipsed or rivalled. They have faults of which the most striking 
are, an occasional overambition of wit; and sometimes, a 
colloquality of phrase and imagery, which the fastidiousness 
of the present age may deem to verge on coarseness. Now 
and then her letters have the appearance of straining to 
shew her ingenuity in what may plausibly be said on a 
subject , rather than the result of her own conviction. She 
was good-natured , polite , acute , and eloquent ; and full 



MRS. SCOTT. 249 

of the stores of wisdom , imagination, and taste ; but more 
fond of ostentation and vanity , than became lier great 
gifts of nature and art. She died in i8oo , at the age of 
80 , at her splendid house in Portman Square. Her nephew, 
on whom she imposed her married name , and on whom 
she settled her large landed property derived from her 
husband's will , has sijice published Four volumes of her 
Letters ; and announces more. 



M.rs SCOTT. 



Her younger sister, Sarah, married George Louis Scott, 
Esq.^ , and died at Catton in Norfolk, in 1795. She had, 
hke M.^^ M. , a turn for literature ; but her talents were 
less brilliant than those of M.^^ Montagu, and were more 
adapted to works of history than those of imagination. Her 
industry and curiosity were great; her memory was strong; 
and her judgment sound. Her Life of cVAubigne is well 
executed ; it is clear , discriminating ; well-selected , and 
judicious ; and obtained for her some popularity as an au- 
thor. She wrote numerous other pieces ; of which she gave 
away the produce in charity ; for her charity was not only 
extensive , but sometimes profuse almost to rashness. 



32 



250 THE AJNTI-CRITIC 

LXXV. 

A^ERSES WRITTEN AS A PREFAGii TO THE 

SYLVAIN^ WANDERER. 

In MDCCCXV. 

Beneath the trees , that with luxariant shade 
O'erhang this Gothic arch , supinely laid , 
I lose th' Autumnal hours ; and while a train 
Of rapid fancies pass my shifting brain , 
Leave them not quite unheeded in my strain. 

Thus broken , glides the busy year away j 
And thus I travel to the final day , 
When freed fiom cares that make this heart their prey, 
Within the grave my mortal part shall rest , 
And my soul rise , I trust , among the blest ! 

When first in leafy Wootton's lone retreat , 
The Muse's haunts my infant tongue would greet, 
I vow'd , if She but deign'd her favouring smile, 
jN^o other passion should my steps beguile ; 
But fickle to my hopes , by fits alone , 
Her glances on my humble prayers were thrown : 
Then mingled purposes , and changing mind , 
Uncertain as the courses of the wind , 
Left each new labour , ere 'twas well begun ; 
And this day's task was by the next undone ! 

Since torn , dear Native Spot , from thy embrace. 
Fate bade me in the worldling's paths to pace ^ 



SYLVAN WA]yDERER. 251 

E'er eighteen summers had matur'd a form , 

With every wild and youthful passion warm , 

In fields how wide , through what a varied scene 

Of pleasures , dangers , sufferings have I been ! 

How little thought I , when for Granta's towers 

I left thy falling leaves , and fading flowers. 

That ne'er again my hapless feet should roam 

Beneath thy shades , and claim them for my home. 

Ere yet a month from scenes so lovely torn , 

An honour'd parent to his grave was borne ! 

Then , where the Hall with mirth and youth had rung , 

And Beauty laugh'd , and talk'd , and danc'd and sung, 

The social circle ceased the day to cheer , 

And lonely Silence reign'd for many a year. 

Now' mid the crowded throngs of men I felt 
The cruel blows that struggling Envy dealt ; 
And innocent days , and peaceful nights, no more 
Were sooth'd with Fancy's dreams, and Learning's lore. 

Ambition spread before my dazzled eyes 
An awful steep ; yet bade me strive to rise. 
But hate to mingle in the clamorous fray , 
Where coarser spirits struggle for the sway ; 
And dread of scorn , and pride that would not yield 
Against a meaner foe to take the field , 
Oft as new ardors waked within my breast , 
Cross'd every step , and every chance supprest- 

O years , that long had turn'd this hair to white, 
Ere yet my thirl ieth winter took its flight : 
Still , as ye urg'd your mournful course anew , 
More dire in dangers , or in griefs ye grew ! 
In thickest shades I hid my tearful form ; 
There , chill'd without , I strove my heart t6 warm : 
E'en there did Malice , and revengeful Ire , 
Pierce the retreat , and dash the hallowed fire. 



2b2 THE AWTI-CRTTIC 

O never, never were there bowers so deep, 

To which calummou;: Hatred could not creep ! 

Long countless days I toll'd , and sigh'd and wept ; 

Long nights in none but broken slumbers slept ! 

But, hell-born Hatred, to thine iron heart 

l^o griefs will e'er a ray of pity dart. 

To break the bands of Friendship and of Love ; 

The charms that soften sorrow to remove ; 

To leave the victim thou hast sworn thy foe , 

]N'aked , defenceless , lonely to his w oe , 

This is thy triumph ! Human Misery 

Owes half her keenest sufferings to thee ! 

But will no transient beams of sun invade 
This gloomy , and scarce penetrable shade ? 

lovely ray , thou com'st ! thy cheering light 

1 hail , to chase my spirit's leuglhen'd night ! 
Disperse , ye clouds ! and let the day-star shine , 
And o'er the past no sad regrets shall pine ! 

It dawns ; but as along the sky it goes , 
Clouds cross , by fits ; and tempests interpose. 
A little while the genial beams impart 
A glow of hope and boldness to my heart; 
How soon to sink again ! The magic spell 
Scarce lingers , while its kind approach I tell. 

If thus a victim to Misfortune's snares, 
Prey to Disease , or to consuming Cares , 
I yet can seize the lyre , and court the Muse , 
And transient comfort o'er this breast diffuse ; 
If yet my soul pours forth the moral lay , 
And seeks with mental flowers to deck the day : 
Dear Fount of purest waves , if where , a boy, 
I drank with awful and mysterious joy, 
I struggle still , or waking , or in dream , 
To cool my thirst with thy immortal stream ; 



CHARLES POWLETT. 253 

May the small gift that now at Virtue's shrine 
Humbly I lay , receive a smile benign ! 

If not to this the brilliant hues belong , 
That decorate an happier son of song , 
Breatli'd from the heart , in age , as once in youth , 
O stamp it with the holier praise of Truth ! 

Lee Priory, Sejjt. 12, 181 5. 



LXXVI. 

POETICA.L ADDRESS 

TO THE 

REVEREND CHARLES POWLETT. 
In MDCCCXVn. 



Long is the space and variably the climes 
Have pass'd in storms and sunshine , since the times 
When first we met in Granta's walks , and drew 
Forms of enchantment in the distant view ! 
Those Forms , as nearer we approach'd , were seen 
Transform'd to Demons of terrific mien ; 
And Grief alone, through many a weeping year, 
Darkness behind us gave ; before us Fear ! 
Yet freed by starts from comfortless Despair , 
Not idly pass'd those days of Hope or Care. 
To learning some , and grave pursuits were given ; 
In some , with stripes were Hate and Envy driven ! 
Full thirty times and more the fitful Sun 
Wearily through his annual course has run , 



254 THE ANTI-CRITIC 

Since blythe in Hackwood's Ducal Hall I heard 
Thy frolic tales of future joy preferr'd. 
The present then was vapid , barren , cold : 
We sigh'd the distant prospect to behold. 
But ah , compared with those too slighted days , 
How big the years to come with clouds and frays ! 
Now wrinkled Age comes oji , and hoary hairs, 
We strive with quiet to compose our cares : 
If e'en a gleam of pleasure intervene , 
We hail the blessing , and in smiles are seen. 
May St thou , since years with rapid footsteps steal , 
While yet tis Autumn , Quiet's blessings feel ; 
Find peace within, while outward to thine eye 
Smile Nature's scenes beneath a mellow sky ; 
Till gently , kindly , bending to the grave , 
Age shall own joys , which youthful days ne'er gave ! 
For me , alas , lives there a hope to warm , 
While clouds still blacken, and still growls the storm? 
Malice , to me fore'er to be assign'd , 
Walks as my shade before me , or behind ; 
Around me draws lines mystical and deep , 
Whose frightful bounds I cannot overleap ; 
Palsies my feet , darts on my lips his spite , 
Rings in my ears ; and blasts my shuddering sight 1 
Sometimes the blood-stain'd Usurer's form he wears; 
Anon from priestly robes his cloven foot appears : 
A thousand varied shapes by turns he takes; 
Spits libels poisonous as the tongues of snakes : 
And onward as his work incessant goes , 
Gives not a moment's respite to my woes! 
But e'en with bleeding heart and madden'd brain, 
See , yet I trifle with the Muse's strain ! 
Dear as the life drops which this heart inspire , 
E'en in the midst of torments , is the lyre ! 
Grosvenor Square .^ Dec. 20, 1817, 



REFLFCTIONS. 255 



LXXVII. 
CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 

If all the blood of all the chiefs , whose name 
Through ten long ages holds historic fame, 
Flow'd in thy fervid veins ; what boots the gift , 
If to like heights thy mind it do not lift ; 
And if it do not urge to rival deeds 
Of those , whom thy degenerate step succeeds ? 
In clouds and darkness if thou wander'st on , 
From dawn to eve , and yet from eve to dawn ; 
If still the vapoury blackness never quits 

10. Thy footsteps , but with wings outspreading sits 
Hovering above thee , like a Fateful Sprite , 
Boots it , the stream once ran in speckless light ? 
Departed Glory is an empty sound : 
Yet more : if not with present Greatness crown'dj 
If Riches lead not ; if the staff of gold 
Do not thy feeble tottering steps uphold; 
Nor purple streams from Kings and Princes sprung, 
Nor glow of mind , nor eloquence of tongue , 
Nor purity of heart , nor virtuous life , 

ao. Can bear thee forward thro' the hopeless strife ! 
Alone , unaided , never cheer'd , unseen ; 
The massive curtain, Fame and thee between. 
Forever hangs unpiercable ; the grave 
Yawns to receive thee ; not a sound shall save 
Thy destined, hapless name : the crumbling earth 
Shall hurry on thee, as of equal worth; 
And into dust thou shalt dissolve ; nor flower 
Shall blossom o'er thee for its transient hour : 
To soothe thy sprite no living stranger's care 



256 THE ANTI-CRITIC. 

3o. To that cold spot tlie dew-hung gift shall bear; 

For thou art doom'd to toil; and toil in vain; 

To sing , and no one listen to thy strain ; 

To -waste thy days in thought ; thy nights in fire ; 

Yet be as one who never touch'd the lyre ! 

A vapid, empty, dreaming, nameless elf; 

Beginning, lingering, ending all in self! 
While happier bards a race of glory run , 

Their wings all deck'd , and glittering to the sun , 

Thy destiny has spoke a gloomier lot ; 
4o. Living , unknown ; to be in death forgot ! 
Ye mobs of wild caprice , who follow blind 

The paths a despot leader has assign'd , 

Who hear no sounds but at your leader's nod ; 
Who see no flowers unnoticed by his rod ; 
What is your senseless praise? An hollow blast, 
That conscious Genius , as it echoing past , 
Should , like an evil sprite , at distance cast ! 
As quick to leave , as forward to pursue , 
It never yet was to the Muses true ! 
5o. Untouch'd it heard the song of Milton ring 

Through earth and heaven from a celestial string ; 
Yet glow'd with rapture at the doggrel chime 
Of wits who put their nonsense into rhyme ! 
Enough ! it grieves no more ! the pang has ceased ! 
From all this thirst of worldly smiles released, 
Deep in myself I wrap my hopes , and fears ; 
Live in my own creation ; and my tears 
And raptures offer to the tribes of light, 
That Fancy brings to my unclouded sight ! 
60. Let the storm howl without ! twill howl in vain ! 
AH shall be song and sunshine in my brain ! 

24 Aprily 1822. ^ 

Appendix. 



Appendix. 



A LITERARY OBITUARY. 



1818. 



I July. Sir Thomas Bernard, Bart. 

3o May. William Burdon Esq. aged 53 , formerly of 
Emanuel College , Cambridge. 

— At Bungay, Co. Suff, M.^^ Ellz. Bonliote , 

aged 74. 

— Hector Macneill Esq. poet , at Edinburgh. 
3o May. Isaac Hawkins Browne, Esq. set. 73. 

— James Cobb Esq. Secretary at the East India 

House , set. 72. 
July. Matthew Gregory Lewis Esq.^ set. 48. 
27 Aug. Rt. Honorable Warren Hastings , aet. 86. 

II Sept. James Bindley Esq. set. 81. 

14 Aug. Rev. Wm. Chafin , of Chettle , Co. Dors. 
set. 87. 

— Rev. Edw. Tew , Greek Scholar , aged 82. 
1 Nov. Sir Samuel Romilly. 

17. Dec. Sir Philip Francis, K. B. 
24 Dec. F. W. Blagdon. 



181 



i3 Jan. Dr. John W^olcot , M.D. known under the 

name of Peter Pinclar. 
5 May. John Giffard Esq. of Dublin , a?t. 74. 
. — Henry Penruddock \\ yndham Esq. ret. 83 ; at 

Salisbury. 



ii Appendix. 

5 May. Rev. James Beiitley Gordon , of Killegny , Co. 
Wexford , author of « the History of the 
Irish Rebellion, I79^ " {etc.') 

George Cartwriglit Esq. aged 79. 

At Birmingham , Mr. Wm. Harrod. 

Joseph Moser Esq. aged 70. 

Richard Chaddick D.D. of Fulham: Hebraist. 

John Playfair of Edinburgh, D.D. set. 70. 

Samuel Lysons Esq. F. A. S. aged 56. 

James Forbes Esq. F. R. S. 

Hugh Moises , M.D. aged 46. 

Cyril Jackson, D.D. aged 73. 

James Watt Esq. F. R. S. ^t. 83. 

Rev. Hen. Rowe, L. L. B. of Ringshall , Suf- 
folk. 

At Vevay , Lord Somerville; set. 54. 

Benj. Moseley , M.D. 

Rev. Charles Edward Stewart , A. M. of Suf- 
folk. 
21 Oct. Hon. Frederic S. North Douglas, only son of 

Lord Glenbervie. 
5 Nov. At Presion , Sussex , Rev. James Douglas, 
F. S. A. 

John Bowles Esq. Barrister, aged 68. 

David Jennings Esq. of Hawkhurst , Kent , 
topographer. 

James Curry , M.D. 

Thomas Marsham Esq. botanist, 

— John Stackhouse , Esq. aged 79 , botanist. 

— George Hill , D.D. of St. Andrews. 

— Richard Miles set. 79 , numismatist. 
2 5 Dec. Rev. Anthony Freston , set. 63. 

1820. 
26 Jan. Hen. Andrews , aged 76 , arithmetician. 



19 


May. 


I 


Jan. 


22 


May. 


20 


July. 


^9 


June. 


I 


Aug. 


17 


May. 


3i 


Aug. 


25 


Aug. 


2 


Sept. 


5 


Oct. 


25 


Sept. 


8 


Oct. 



3o 


Oct. 


6 


Dec. 


26 


Nov. 


26 Nov. 



Appendix. hi 

^6 Feb. Rev. Rogers Ruding , R. D. F. S. A. etc. 
set. 69. 

11 Feb. Thomas Haweis , D.D. aged 86 , at Rath. 

1 3 Feb. At Dublin , Leonard Macnally , aged 68. 

14 March. Michael Underwood, M.D. aged 84. 

i5 March. Eliz. widow of Capt. Edw. Howorth , R. N. 

aged 85. 
8 April. At Pau in France, Thomas, Earl of Selkirk, 

aet. 49. 
a6 April. Edw. Topham Esq, aet. 69. 

12 April. Arthur Young , Esq. set. 79. 

a5 April. Pa'rick Colquhoim Esq. LLD. aged 76. 

1 5 April. At Rome , John Bell, Surgeon. 
4 .Tune. Rt. Hon. Hen. Gratfan , set. 74. 

27 May. At Bath, Rev. Josiah Thomas , A. M. aged 60. 
3 June. Sam. Pipe Wolferstan Esq. of Statfold , Co. Staff. 

aged 69. 
19 June. Sir Joseph Banks, Bart. K. B. 9et. 80- 
27 June. Dr. Wm. Lort Mansell , Bishop of Bristol; 

aet, 69. 

— William Richardson , D.D. of Clonfecle , Co. 

Antrim , aged 80. 

— John Trusler , LLD. aged 85. 
Peter Dollond , optician , aged 90, 
Dr. Bennet, Bishop of Cloyne , ^t. 75. 
At Edinburgh , Dr. John Murray , Chemical 

philosopher. 
Rev. Cha. Edw. de Coetlogon , A. M. 
John Hatsell Esq. set. 78. 
Wm. Fielding Esq. aged 73. 
Earl of Malmsbury , ^t. 75. 
Rev. Wm. Tooke, F. R. S. , aged 76. 
Wm. Hayley Esq. aged 75. 
At Manchester, Mr. Thomas Barritt, Antiquary; 

set. 77. 



1 


July. 


16 


July. 


21 


July. 


16 


Sept. 


i5 


Oct. 


I 


Oct. 


21 


Nov. 


17 


Nov. 


12 


Nov. 


22 


Oct. 



IV 






Nov. 


i8 


Nov. 


20 


. Sept. 


4 


Dec. 


27 


Nov. 


16 


Dec. 


2 


April, 



Appendix. 

Richard Whallev Bridgraan Esq. set. Sg. 
Prof. Young of Glasgow. 

Mr. John Dawson , of Sedbergh , in York- 
shire , mathematician , ?et. 86. 
Mr. Sam. Rousseau , printer , aged 57. 
Hen. Jermyn Esq. of Sibton , Saffolk , aet. 53. 
Sir Geo. Onesiphorus Paul , Bart. 
Wm. Parnell Esq. M. P. 

182I. 

18 Jan. Charles Runninglon , Sergt. at Law, 9et. 70. 
7 Jan. Mrs. John Hunter, poetess , aet. 70. 

11 Feb. Adam Walker, Lecturer in Natural Philosophy, 

aged 90. 

12 Jian. Sir John Macpherson Bart. 

5 March. At an advanced age , Richard Twiss Esq. 

12 March. At Florence , Capt. Wm. Pit. Broughton , R. N. 

21 March. Michael Bryan Esq. aet. 64 , aulhor of the 

Dictionaiy of Painters. 
9 April. At Whitby, Yorkshire, Tho. Bateman, M.D. 

set. 43. 
2 May. Mrs. Piozzi , aged 82. 
1 5 May. John Bonnycastle Esq. Mathematician. 
i3 May. AVm. Stevenson, F.S.A. aet. 72, Printer at 

Norwich. 
3o May. Earl of Sheffield, fet. 82. 

— James Gregory M.D. at Edinburgh, aged 6^. 

— Rev. Tho. Scott , of Aston-Sandford, Co. Bucks. 
At Cheshunt, Herts, O'iver Cromwell^ Esq. aged 79. 
Sir Francis Milman , Bt. M.D. «t. 75. 
James Carmichael Smyth , M.D. set. 80. 
Rev. W. P. Warburton, of Lydd, Rent , aged 60. 
Tho. Morgan , LLD. set. 69. Dissenting Minister. 
Mrs. Eliz. Inchbald , aged 66. 



3i 


May. 


24 


June. 


18 


June, 


21 


July. 


I 


Aug. 



Appendix. v 

— John Scott , author oi Letters from France , etc., 

killed in a duel by Mr. Christie. 
9 July. Rev. Peter Gandolphy , Roman Catholic Priest. 
— - Mr John Ballantyne , Prinler of Edinburgh. 

Rev. Vicesimus Knox , D.D. set. 69. 
Francis Hargrave , Esq. Barrister, set. 81. 
John Rennie , Esq. the celebrated Engineer , 

act. 64. 
Wm. Angus , engraver , aged 69. 
At Worcester, James Ross, engraver, get. 76. 
At Oxford , Joseph Harper Esq. D.C.L. 
Rear Adm. James Burney, F. R. S. aet. 72. 
At Norwich Edw. Rigby , M.D. set. 74. 
At Dublin , John Barrett , D.D. 
Lord Henniker , aet. 70. 

James Perry Esq. Editor of the Morning Chro- 
nicle , aged 65. 
Rev. John Malham , set, 75. 
Sir James Mansfield , Kt. set. 88. 
Mary , relict of Rev. Geo. Sewel , daughter of 
Sir Wm. Young, Bt. 



6 


Sept. 


16 


Aug. 


4 


Oct. 


12 


Oct. 


16 


Sept. 


2 


Oct. 


17 


Nov. 


27 


Oct. 


i5 


Nov. 


4 


Dec. 


4 


Dec. 


19 


Sept. 


23 


Nov. 


9 


Dec. 



8 



2 2, 



Jan. George Isted Esq. 

23 Feb. James Boswell Esq. 

9 March. Dr. Edw. Daniel Clarke , Librarian of Cam- 
bridge University Library, the celebrated 
Traveller, aged 54. 



VI Appendix. 



THE AIN^TI- CRITIC. 

August 1821. — March 1822. 

By Sir Egerton Brydges, Bar.* . 

CONTENTS. 

Page 
Art. I. Introductory. Character of Modern Cri- 
ticism , 1 

— II. On the Prevailing 'English Opinions of 

Poetry , 4 

• — III. Barnahee's Journal by Hi chard Brath- 

wait : Edit, by J. Haslewood^ .... 29 

— IV. Petrarch's Industry., 38 

— V. Milton s self confidence , 39 

— VF. Young's Universal Passion^ 40 

— VI [. Gray^s Pursuits , and Habits., 40 

— VIJI. Poetry , 45 

— IX. Cowper , 47 

— X. Censures of Pope 48 

— ' XI. True Principles of Poetry , 49 

— Xtl. Proper Objects of Authors , 57 

— XIII. Rousseau , 64 

— XIV. Fame finally just , 65 

— XV. Sympathy in the sentiments and Con- 

dit'ons of Lfe , 67 

— XVI. Praise of Scott's Novels ; — and of 

loi e of reading , 6S 



Appendix. vii 

Page 
Art. XVJI. Lcike of Geneva^ « 69 

— XVIII. Beattles Minstrel, 70 

— XIX, Cowper no Im^entor , 77 

— XX. On Moral and Domestic Poetry, . . 80 
~ XXI. Exaggeration of Critical Censure^ S3 

— XXII. Busy and Intriguing Authors , . . . . 84 

— XXni. Genius of Burns , 85 

— XXIV. Br. Joseph Warton , 89 

— XXV. Thomas Warton, 92 

— XXVI. Barity of Good Poets , 96 

— XXVII. Shenstone , , . 100 

— XXVIII. Goldsmith, 102 

— XXVIII. ^ Bibliomania , 116 

— XXIX. Qualities of the Historian and Poet 

different^ 118 

— XXXf . Spenser , 120 

— XXXII. Bemi-Ancients , 120 

— XXXIIL Hume , 122 

— XXXIV. Original Writers , 123 

— XXXV. Trui^ellers, 124 

— XXXVI. Fame, 125 

— XXXVII. Philosophers and Poets, 126 

— XXXVIII. Birth, 127 

--. XXXIX. The Same , 128 

— XL. — House of Bourbon, .... 129 

— XLI. The Same , 130 

— XLII. Memoirs , 131 

- — XLIII. ^ Copyright , 132 

— XLiV\ ha Fontaine , 133 

— X.LV. Fragment of an Inscription , 135 

" — XL VI. A Poetical Fragment. Alphonso , . . 146 

— XLVII. Poems of M. A. Flaminius , 150 

— XLVIII. Tragic Tales. Coningsby and Broken- 

hurst , 156 



VIII 



Art. 



XLvin 

XLIX. 

L. 

LI. 

LII. 

LIII. 

LIV. 

LV. 

LVI. 



— . LVII. 



— LVIII. 



LVIII. ^ 
LIX. 
LX. 
LXT. 

Lxn. 

LXIII. 

LXIV. 

LXV. 

LXVL 

LXVU. 

LXVIII. 

LXIX. 

LXX. 

LXXI. 

LXXTI. 

LXXIII. 

LXXVI 



Appendix. 

Page 

MJall of Hellingsley , 164 

The Fountain of Helicon^ 166 

Egotisms^ 168 

Egotisms continued , 170 

Sir Ralph Willoughby , 173 

Le-Forester , 177 

Arthur Fitzalhini^ 181 

Mary de Clifford^ 183 

Liierary distinction the result of in- 
trigue , 187 

Prose Fictions classed ; with their 

uses , 188 

Inscriptions , 191 

Cenotaph , Wootton , . 194 

Cenotaph , Ickhani , 197 

Cenotaph , Norton , . 199 

Inscj-iption , TVestcliffe, 200 

Inscription , D.® , 201 

Inscription , Ickhani , 202 

Inscription , Chester , 203 

Inscription , Hidge-Hertfordshire , . . 204 

Inscription , Little Gaddesden , 205 

Memoirs of Gihhon Family , 206 

Lord Chancellor Hardwicke , 225 

Consolation^ a Poem, by Quillinan , . . 228 
Lines to the Memory of E. W. 

Brydges , by the Same , 233 

Stanzas written at Sudely Castle^ . . . 237 

Epitaph, penshurst, 240 

Rousseau , 242 

Blrs. Montagu , 244 



Appendix. ix 

Page 
LXXV. Poetical Preface to Sylvan Wanderer^ . . . 250 
LXXVI. Poetical Address to Rev. Charles Powlett^ 253 
LXXVII. Concluding Re/lections , a Poem , 255 



Appendix. 

ADVERTISEMENT. 

On Oct. 29, 1 82 1 was published: 

(^By Mess.^^ hongman and Co. London) 
In 3 vol. 12.° 

THE HALL OF HELLmGSLEY; 

A TALE. 

By Sir Egerton Brydges , Bar,^ 



The time^ at which the events of this Tale are supposed 
to have happened^ w^as the Reign of King James I^ when 
a period of pusillanimous peace^ succeeding an age of gal- 
lantry and adventure , gave occasion to great excesses in 
the internal police of the kingdom. Then it was that many 
of the younger sons of Great Houses., left without employ- 
ment., and driven from the Court by Scotch Favouritism ., 
retired into the Country to follow the Chace , and other 
sports of the Field ; and to indulge in a licentious hos- 
pitality , which the want of adequate means to support , 
led to all sorts of irregularity and violence. 

This was a crisis , which made a rapid inroad upon 
the power and glory of the old English Feudal and His- 
torical Families. Then the harvest-men of the Eighth Harry's 
Reformation concentrated and coi firmed their power. The 
Veres., the Greys, the Cliffords, the Berkeleys, the Percys, 
the Nevilles , etc. were in a rapid state 0/ decadence. 

To bring forward characters out of this class of so- 
ciety , and to invest them with personal qualities suffi- 
ciently eminent to engage the interest cf those whose minds 
are fitted to enjoy the enthusiasm of poetical delineation; 



Appendix. xi 

ivho love those energies of sentijnent^ and vivacities ofcon^ 
Jlicting emotion , which partake of the colours of Hq- 
mance , maj^ , it is hoped , be considered as an offering 
of instructive amusement to those refined readers , who 
derive refreshment from setting their fancies afloat from 
the vapid recurrence of the scenes of daily life. 

The epoch chosen was an epoch at once of superstition^ 
of poetry ^ and of learning ^ which gives room for the 
portraiture of characters bold and striking , yet polished. 
Sentiment and description , unembodied and undramatised, 
are apt to be tedious. But when the gradual develope— 
ment of a story skilfully complicated connects itself with 
those sentiments and descriptions., it raises a temperatnent 
in which they are readily and eagerly received. The sen- 
timents and descriptions therefore , in which the charac- 
ters introduced abound., will not, it is trusted^ be deemed 
out of place. 

The Author has not the weakness to hint ^ or to sup- 
pose , that the style and mode which he has chosen , are 
ejcclusively desirable. He only argues , that it is one of 
the diversified modes., which may fairly be put in use for 
the innocent exercise of the varied powers of the human 
mind. To study the characters of more familiar life., and 
be aided in withdrawing the veil from the movements by 
which the conflict of ordinary society is carried on , may 
justly intermingle itself among the changing occupations 
of the inquisitive intellect. But unhappily , they who take 
up this taste , have no mercy for any other. Nothing is 
endurable by them., which they do not consider practical : 
a word of veiy indefinite meaning , which they bend to 
their own narrow purposes. The iiiflusnce of Imagination^ 
in <c breaking the twilight gloom of life , » has been nobly 
desci^ibed by Gray. And it is by the glow of visionary 
forms ^ that we can give energy to the flatness of Reality I 



XII Appendix. 

All are condemned to the lassitudes and the sufferings 
of life. To soothe the hour of pain , and relieve the in- 
trusion of sorrow , is to he a public benefactor : — but it 
must be done by virtuous means ; by ameliorating the heart ; 
by aiding the pure fancy ; and by elevating the under- 
standing. To call the mind to n fresh woods and pastures 
new ; » to people it with new company^ and open a gal- 
lery oj new portraits^ infuses a new impulse, and revived 
force to the worn ideas. 

het the fate of this Tale be what it may , the Public 
cannot rob the Author of the pleasure ab^eady received 
from the composition of it ! 
27 April, 1822. 



In a few days will appear: 

JULIETTA: 

A TALE. 

TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL ITALIAN 
Of LUIGI da PORTO. 

By F. D. S. Esq."^ 



This scarce and beautiful Tale is the foundation of 
Shakespear's Romeo aisd Juiiet. The original has been 
reprinted by IMr. Ho I well Carr , as his contribution to 
the Rosburglie Club. The Translation forms Art. I. of 

the POL^AKTHEA. 



NOTICE CRITIQUE 

SUR UN ROMAN 



INTITULE 



THE HALL OF HELLINGSLEY- 



The Hall of Hellingslej, a Tale ; by Sir Egerton 
Brydges , Bar.*^ 3 vol. 12.° London, Longman 
etc. (October 29) 1821. 

Le Chateau de Hellingsley , Roman ; par Sir 
Egerton Brjdges, baronet, 3 vol. in-\iP Lon- 
dres chez Longman^ etc. fig Octobre) 1821. 



V^N a vu , depuis quelque temps , des litterateurs distin- 
gues s'ocCuper de preference a ecrire des Contes ou des 
Romans. Cette entreprise n'est pas sans danger ; car un 
ouvrage mediocre pent porter tin coup fatal a la repu- 
tation d'un auteur , que ses talens au};oriseroient a des 
pretentions plus elevees. Mais , il faut alors qu'il ait un 
juste sentiment de ses forces , et que son jugeraent ne 
soit point influence par celui d'une multitude capricieuse , 
dont le gout est corrompu par des outrages destines par- 
ticulierement a frapper Fimagination et a produire des 
sensations fortes. Les personnes qui ne prisent que I'eclat 



d'un faux coloris , Irouvent insipides et plates les cou~ 
leurs simples de la verite. Celle-ci , cependant ( quelque 
contradiction que des esprits superficiels pussent trouver 
dans cette assertion ) , ceile-ci , prise dans le sens le plus 
elendu , peut tout autant servir de base a des ouvrages 
d'imagination qua des discusions savantes. Les sujets qu'on 
traite ne sont pas moins susceptibles de developpement , 
soit qu'on les considere sous le rapport des faits , soit qu'on 
y donne carriere a son imagination ; mais lorsqu'on a recours 
a cette derniere pour faire ressorlir la verite , il ne faut ni 
passer Irop rapidement sur les faits, ni s'etendre longuement 
sur ceux que la biograpiiie efc I'histoire font deja suffisam- 
ment connoitre. L'auteur doit presenter les observations 
qu'une sensibilite active et un esprit brillant sait tirer de son 
sujet ; car des faits particuliers ne sont qu'une matiere inerte, 
qui, en rempechant de s'elever aux verites generales, 
eloignent celui qui ne raconte que des faits , de cette hau- 
teur d'ou Ton peut contempler la verite dans tout son eclat. 
C'est a ces caracteres que nous pouvons reconnoitre l'au- 
teur du genre le plus eleve , et le plus fertile en invention, 
en fall de romans ou de fictions ; celui qui s'abandonne 
avec confiance a cette puissance 

« Qui donne une existence et un nom a des etres ideaux 
et presque aeriens. ■» (*) 

L'epoque comprise dans ce recit est celle du regne de 
Jaques I.*^*' : le lieu de la scene est un des comtes de 
I'ouest. L'auteur , accoutume a considerer avec une sorte 
d'entliousiasme une periode ou la gloire de I'aristocratie 
feodale n'etoit pas encore entierement eteinte , developpe 
son sujet, ses caracteres, le tableau du pays et des eve- 
nemens d'une maniere tres-animee et analogue a son ca- 



(^) «\Vhicli gives to airy nothing 

A local habitation and a name. 



ractere, Un Roman qu'il a public a I'age de 27 ans, et 
celui qu'il donne aujourd'hui, qu'il en a atteint 69, peu- 
venl faire juger de Fidentite de sa maniere de sentir dans 
ces deux epoques , puisque les couleurs de ces productions, 
presentant les memes teintes , montrent qu'elles sont celles 
memes de son esprit. 

II y a cependant une grande difference entre ces ouvrages 
d'imagination et ceux du meme genre que I'auteur a deja 
fait paroilre. Jusqu'ici , on pouvoit a peine dire que ses 
romans presentassent un plan, tandis que celui de I'ouvrage 
actuel est profondement combine et developpe successive- 
ment , sans interruption , depuis le commencement jusqu'a 
la fin. C'est une histoire mysterieuse , que les diverses classes 
de lecteurs jugeront sans doute d'une maniere differente , 
suivant le plus ou le moins de probabilite et d'interet qu'ils 
y trouYeront , d'apres leurs dispositions respectives. 

11 n'est que trop vrai que les moeurs du temps de Jaques 
I.^^ furent souillees par des actes de violence et d'injus- 
tice, que les cadets de plusieurs des grandes families etoient 
alors dans un veritable etat de pauvrete , et que , livres 
a eux- memes , sans emploi , et dans un temps ou le ser- 
vice public ne leur offroit aucune ressource , vivant a peu 
de distance d'une epoque ou Ton faisoit un cas particulier de la 
galanterie et des avantures extraordinaires , ils n'etoient que 
trop disposes a se livrer a une conduite licentieuse, que nos 
mc^urs actuelles sont bien loin d'autoriser ; mais un tel 
etat de choses peut fournir un grand nombre d'incidens 
propres a exciter une vive emotion et a fixer le lecteur , 
en interessant son coeur et en donnant de Fexercice a son 
imagination. 

Les objets qui sont constamment sous nos yeux, cessent 
d'exciter notre sensibilile et de reveiller nos idees. Aussi 
le but d'une fiction est-il de nous soustraire a I'em- 
pire de quelqu'objet qui nous occupe exclusivement , ou a 



i'abattement que produit en nous ' une suite d'idees som- 
bres. Nous n'avons pas besoin qu'on nous offre des ta- 
bleaux qui se presentent a nous a chaque instant ; il nous 
faut de la nouveaute , et des occasions d'exercer notre 
energie. II faut qu'on nous peigne le passe avec autant de 
force et de verite que s'il n'eut pas cesse d'exister ; et que 
ce qui n'est qu'ideal , s'offre a nous sous I'apparence de la 
realite. 

C'est la le but que s'est propose I'auteur de ce Roman. 
Les lecteurs decideront s'il a reussi ou non , suivant que 
leurs idees sympatiseront avec les siennes. II s'est peint 
dans cet ouvrage de son imagination , qui lui paroit me- 
riter la preference sur tous les autres ouvrages sortis de 
sa plume. (*) 

(*) Voyez la Notice Critique du Roman de Coningsby par le 
raenae Auteur, Bibliolheque Unwerselle, Ai^riL, 1822. 










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